German Shepherd Mom

Doggy Drama

2012-01-30T11:54:00.000-05:00

Last Wednesday, courtesy of Kodiak’s very intense interest, I found a mass on Reyna’s rear, just under her tail. Yes, Reyna has a mass on her ass. Or, if you prefer, a bump on her rump. Dr. Lapham thinks its an infected anal gland and it should be better after 10 days of antibiotics, hot packing and cleaning. Paws crossed he’s right, because he’s concerned about the fact that its on the same side of her body as the masses on her belly a few short months ago. If this thing isn’t dramatically improved within the 10 days, we have to consider the possibility that its connected to whatever caused the other masses. Which would be very much not good. Poor Reyna, she’s got an infection, she’s taking antibiotics that make her feel ooky, and her mom is messing with her butt twice a day. Its no wonder she’s not a happy pup these days. And naturally, this all occurred two days after I told WakeMed that Reyna was ready to go back to work…

Duncan apparently decided I didn’t have enough stress in my life and he had a grand mal seizure Thursday night. I awoke to a loud thump and then took a few seconds to realize the noise I was hearing wasn’t the pups roughhousing. I talked to Dr. Lapham Friday morning and we agreed to hold off on medicating Duncan. His first grand mals were last June, and his last seizure was December 22, which put him just a bit outside the 30 day window of concern. I decided to go home early to check on Duncan and get Reyna ready for her appointment. I’m glad I did, because I found significant evidence that Duncan had another grand mal during the 4 or so hours I was gone. Another call to Dr. Lapham resulted in “bring him in, its time for meds.” So now my poor puppy is on a (relatively) low dose of Phenobarbital. With luck, that will be enough to control the seizures but not cause too many side effects. I still have nightmares about all the side effects Reyna went through when she was on it several years ago. Since its Dr. Lapham and not the vet school handling the case, we’ll have more flexibility with the dose. So far, I’ve only noticed a slight increase in Duncan’s lack of coordination. Of course, its Duncan, so a lack of coordination is something of a given… No grand mal seizures since Friday morning, thank goodness. We’ll just have to keep our paws crossed and see how things go.

On the good side of things, the mass Kodiak got from his rabies vaccination is still there, but it is significantly smaller than it was. It should continue to shrink with time.

Daddy's Little Girl

2012-01-20T20:17:00.002-05:00

Junior Herding Dog

2012-01-10T09:31:00.000-05:00

Way back at the end of October, Kodiak entered his first sheep herding trial. Turns out he's pretty darn awesome! He ran the Junior Herding Dog course each day, qualified both times, and earned his JHD title. So proud of my little pup!

Renee took the video for me, but those darn trees were in the way of so much of the action. They had a photographer out there, and thankfully she had a good vantage point.

Kodiak had been having trouble focusing during our practices runs - too many distractions - uness we were moving quickly, so thats what I did Saturday. I didn't actually run, but I was moving at nearly a jog, which turned out to be not such a great idea on really wet ground. You can't see it well in the video, but I do a lovely fly-and-slide near the far panels. Kodiak was great - he didn't panic at all like I was afraid he would. He just waited til I got up and then kept on moving the sheep (he did have to stop and check the tree that had been watered by a dog a couple of runs before him). Kodiak even had a nice stop at the pen.

You can actually tell that I was moving fast in the photos.

Right before I launch...

Thanks goodness the ground was soft. I even managed to slide a bit. In my defense, I was not the only person to hit the ground that day.

And then we calmly strolled off to the pen.

Sunday went better in that I stayed upright, but the sheep were a little more reactive to Kodiak. I didn't set him up quite close enough to the fence, so one sheep decided to bolt. Kodiak did a pretty decent job of getting the sheep back to the flock, but he did take a bit to have fun chasing it first. Our repen wasn't quite as nice as Saturday's but that was due to the sheep being spazzy and the fact that I hadn't worked Kodiak very much on holding sheep calmly. But thats okay - he qualified!

I love this shot of his take-off.

No sheep, but a gorgeous photo.

Once we had the flock together, Kodiak did a great job of staying back so they wouldn't bolt. I was still moving briskly, but certainly not jogging.

The photographer also got some great candid shots of Kodiak over the weekend.

Overall, I was really pleased with the weekend. Kodiak even handled the environment pretty well. He had a bit of a fright when the wind blew a chair over at one point, and he certainly wasn't keen on people coming up to pet him, but thats okay. His tail was up most of the weekend and he was very rarely truly stressed. And he did a great job with the sheep! I can't wait til I have time and money again and can get him back to practicing. It'll be fun to see how he handles a regular course.

Stocking #2

2012-01-08T22:42:00.000-05:00

I finished Mikey's stocking tonight. I ended up choosing the Grey Heather yarn because it has the same silvery sheen as his fur.

So Pleased With Me

2012-01-01T16:00:00.000-05:00

Several years ago, I bought Christmas stockings for everyone and had their names embroidered on the cuffs (burgundy for the girls, deep green for the boys). It wasn't an issue last year, since Kodiak was just a foster pup who'd be heading to his new home the following month. Or so I thought.

This Christmas, I realized I was one stocking short. I checked with the place that did the original stockings, but they weren't selling them anymore. Obviously, Kodiak couldn't have a stocking that looked completely different from everyone else's. I thought about buying some generic stockings at Wal-Mart and writing their names on the cuffs with glitter, but I generally suck at that sort of thing. I pondered the problem for a while, and then one day I was working on an afghan and it occurred to me - there MUST be crochet patterns for Christmas stockings out there somewhere! I hunted around, found a book with designs I liked and a couple of patterns on the internet, smushed them together into something more personal, and voila! We have Christmas stockings!

I started this one yesterday afternoon and finished it up a little bit ago (didn't get much else done yesterday). I'm really pleased with how it turned out, especially since the only things I've crocheted so far have been afghans. Everyone will get a different color and a slightly different look to the cuff. Belle's stocking is Victorian Rose, Reyna's will be Wine Country (a nice deep red), Khar'pern is getting Persimmon, and Per'la's will be Sunshine. For Loki, Mikey, Parm, Duncan and Kodiak, I have Light Country Blue, Sage, Ocean, Forest Floor, Orchid and Grey Heather (yes, I realize I have one color more than I do boys). I just haven't settled on who gets which color...

Buh-Bye, 2011

2012-01-01T12:34:00.000-05:00

I have to confess, I'm glad 2011 is over. Don't get me wrong, good things happened, but the bad things were really stressful.

In the good column (in no particular order):
Kodiak officially joined the family.
Reyna became a therapy dog.
All of the pups learned new skills and earned various titles/certificates.
I learned to crochet.
After two years, I finally got a job that pays reasonable money and might actually last more than a few months.
I started selling Mary Kay.
We had a successful raffle raising money for Reyna's medical bills.
I met a great guy who gives me deer parts to feed the animals.
The switch to raw has been great for pups and kitties alike.

In the bad column:
I had to stop working with a great pup trainer due to schedule conflicts (this one isn't bad like the others, it just makes me sad).
I had massive financial issues due to lack of work, stress over potentially losing the house, problems with the state about taxes, and general "how do I pay for this" worries.
First there were problems with Reyna's kidneys, then we spent months dealing with multiple masses on her belly, including surgery and so many useless trips to the vet.
Duncan had two grand mal seizures in June and what appeared to be a mild seizure shortly before Christmas.
My sweet Mikey was diagnosed with lymphoma two weeks before Christmas. He's still fighting, but he's having a rough time.

So, yeah, I'm glad 2011 is done. Paws crossed 2012 will be better.

Merry Christmas!

2011-12-24T09:58:00.002-05:00

We Like It Raw, Baby!

2011-12-04T21:11:00.000-05:00

I've been feeding the pups 100% raw since October and they're all loving it. We're using the Whole Prey Model, which is 80% meat, 10% bone, and 10% organ, with half of that being liver. Between the 3 of them, they go through 6lbs of food a day - 3lbs for Duncan, 2lbs for Reyna, and 1lb for Kodiak. This is why I keep stalking the deer processor.

Its been interesting to see how different their tastes are regarding what they like and don't like. Kodiak likes anything and everything (and I do mean everything) and as much of it as he can get. Duncan likes most things, but he has a few items he just won't eat. For some reason, he's boycotting turkey hearts right now, although he was fine eating them a month ago. Reyna seems to be good with most meats, but there have been a couple of things she's refused. Her biggest issue is bones - she doesn't like the bones to be too big. We've found a few work-arounds with that, so its no real problem.

Some of the benefits I've seen with the new diet - Reyna's regained the weight she lost, everyone's fur is gorgeous and feels softer and cleaner than ever, their teeth are whiter, and their poops are smaller. Whats not to like?

Here's Reyna enjoying a turkey neck. This is one of the few boney items that she likes and there's the added benefit of glucosamine in all those jointy pieces. Duncan doesn't seem to care for turkey necks much, although he'll occasionally eat half a neck. Kodiak can't have them because he likes to gulp and I'm worried he'll choke on them.

Duncan likes the big turkey legs. He doesn't get them often because of the high bone content. He also doesn't get them when I have to leave for work - he's slow enough eating meaty meals, never mind when he has to take his time and work through the bones.

Kodiak gets turkey legs on very rare occasions. One leg is about his daily allotment and the bone is enough to cover him for a couple of days. He's great with large food, though, because it makes him slow down and really work it, rather than gulp and go.

There are a few of us in the area that feed raw and we've tracked down some wholesale suppliers that will sell to us by the case, as well as a couple of farms that will give us good deals on spare parts. My deer guy is great, but I only have a few more weeks when I can get meat and bones from him. Thank goodness for extra freezers!

Gotcha!

2011-12-03T11:30:00.000-05:00

12/3/2010, Kodiak came into our home as a foster puppy. He never left. I'm so glad he's a part of our family (even when he won't put his ears up for pictures). Happy Gotcha Day, Kodiak!

Yeah, I Know...

2011-11-27T21:32:00.000-05:00

I'm way behind. Its been mentioned more than once. The last several weeks have had a lot going on, some good, some not so good, and even though I've intended to update the blog several times, the motivation just hasn't kicked in. I've got a few individual posts in mind for some things that happened over the last month (not to mention a ton of photos to share), but this one will just be a (relatively) brief sum-up.

The vets still don't know what's causing the masses on Reyna's belly. Another one appeared in early November and we managed to get her to the vet school before it ruptured so they could take samples for biopsies and cultures. They admitted that they didn't give her enough pain meds to keep it from hurting when they took the samples, and it was obvious to me that she wasn't sufficiently drugged. The soreness unfortunately got her fixated on her belly and I had a lot of trouble keeping her from licking this time around. For whatever reason, she still has an open sore from the biopsy, when she should be completely healed by now.

The Derm vet is apparently still running things, so he and I have talked a few times since the biopsies. They didn't get any definitive answers from the biopsies or the cultures. They requested the slides of the samples taken during the surgery so they could do a comparison - nothing useful came from that. The last time I talked to the Derm vet, they were running a special stain on the samples to try and determine if she has a microbacterial infection. They can't find anything else, so that's their current guess. To add to the fun, if the stain comes back negative, it doesn't actually mean there aren't any microbacteria - it could just mean they took the sample from the wrong place. The vet put Reyna on two new antibiotics (microbacteria are apparently resistant to the various antibiotics she's already taken) to see if that clears up her belly. I picked up the new meds yesterday and gave her the first dose last night. I woke up this morning to discover that Reyna's face, head, and forelegs were swollen - one of the less-likely but still possible side effects of these particular antibiotics. I've been dosing her with Benadryl, but her head is still a bit puffy. At least she can open her eyes all the way now.

Kodiak earned his Junior Herding Dog title at the end of October. I have videos of both runs, and someday the woman who took pictures of his runs will get around to letting me have copies. I was really pleased with Kodiak - even though other things at the trial freaked him out, he was able to focus on the sheep and do his job.

Reyna had a nose work seminar this past weekend, and I took all of the pups. The last time I left Duncan home alone for two days, he was a basket case for several days after we returned. I think he was much happier traveling with us, despite the cramped truck and hanging in a crate all day.

The pups had their Santa Paws photos taken recently. Still debating going back for a re-try, since I only really liked one of the photos.

I started feeding all three pups a totally raw diet several weeks ago. They love it, and I'm thrilled to report that Reyna has gained back all the weight she lost this summer. Their coats feel wonderful and their teeth are gorgeous. I met a fellow who processes deer and he's hooked me up a few times with meat, bones and organs. In fact, I got an entire deer from him yesterday. He's also talking to other hunters for me to see if anyone would be willing to shoot a few deer for me. So far, I've gotten about 80lbs of meat from him. There's still about five weeks left in the season, so hopefully I'll get a lot more before its all over.

I recently started selling Mary Kay to bring in a little extra income, and shortly after that I got my first real job in two years. Its a contract position that's currently scheduled to end in May or June, but we'll see what happens when we get closer. The wonderful thing is that it actually pays real money. The bad thing is I have to figure out when to squeeze in all my dog activities...

I think that just about covers the highlights of the last several weeks. Photos and videos to come later.

Reyna's Raffle

2011-11-02T21:04:00.000-04:00

The winners of the raffle prizes were drawn this afternoon by Reyna and Kodiak. They'll be notified via email and the prizes mailed out. Thanks so much to everyone who purchased tickets and made donations!

Reyna's Helping Paws

2011-10-15T11:00:00.000-04:00

Some of you know about my financial circumstances, but for those of you who don't, I was laid off two years ago from a well-paying job. Since then, I've struggled to find regular work but have only managed to find part-time and temporary positions. We've been getting by, but Reyna's recent medical bills are beyond my current financial capabilities. To help with this, several folks have donated items for a raffle. Many thanks to Suzie Kalafian of Superior Dog Training, Claire Apple of Dog Training for Obedience and Herding with Claire Apple, J. Lee of Portraits by J. Lee, and several others.

Tickets are $5 each and give you a chance to win each item offered! Tickets can be purchased by sending money through PayPal to jhamlin@nc.rr.com. The more tickets you purchase, the more chances you have to win! The raffle runs through Wednesday, November 2, when Reyna (or a pack member) will select the winners.

Hand crafted by Bob Christensen. Bowl measures 10” diameter x 4 3/4" tall.

Custom towel with a whimsical Christmas dog design embroidered by Ellen Christensen.

Hand towel with welcome bird and bird house embroidered by Ellen Christensen.

Hand crafted by Bob Christensen. Beautiful custom pen comes complete with cross pen insert and takes cross pen refills.

9"x12" watercolor painted by local artist and dog trainer, Claire Apple.

7"x10" watercolor painted by local artist and dog trainer, Claire Apple.

Large short-sleeve t-shirt.

8"x10" acrylic painting by local artist Iris Preissing.

7"x10" watercolor painted by local artist and dog trainer, Claire Apple.

9"x12" watercolor painted by local artist and dog trainer, Claire Apple.

8"x10" acrylic painting by local artist Iris Preissing.

Large Ruffwear K-9 Float Coat, donated by local artist and dog trainer, Claire Apple.

Gold and diamond heart pendant.

You could win a beautiful pet portrait by Portraits by Lee. Just send in a picture of your pet and receive a 10 x 8 painting!

Today's Vet School Visit

2011-10-06T21:21:00.000-04:00

Lot's of info from today's visit, but not a lot of definitive answers (anyone surprised by this?). Let's start with the easy stuff...

The urine tests showed that her kidney's are working normally, with her UPC back down in the normal range.

Her hip x-rays showed that the implant looks just like it did two years ago, no sign of infection or other problems. They also showed that her left hip looks a lot worse than it did two years ago, but that's not a surprise, either. Its good to know that the implant is doing its job.

The sore that was on Reyna's belly two weeks ago appears to have healed up, although its a bit hard to tell since the latest mass ruptured fairly close to the last one. The vets are happy with the general improvement (smaller sores) but concerned that there was a new mass. The bacterial infection is completely cleared up, but Reyna is to finish the last week of her antibiotics. The Derm vet prescribed two topicals (one anti-fungal and one antibacterial) to keep the infection gone until she sees him on the 18th. They did a surface swab today and found eosinophilic inflammatory cells, which can be caused by parasitic infections, allergies, bug bites, foreign bodies or certain tumors. The Internal Med vet still thinks there's some underlying cause to these masses/sores, but the Derm vet has a different opinion. He seems to think that the healing incision has irritated Reyna and she's causing the sores by licking the thin skin. Of course, he's not explaining how she's creating the masses first, nor is he explaining what caused the initial mass/sore that resulted in the surgery that created the incision... We'll chat about all of that on the 18th. And about the fact that if Reyna were reacting to an irritation of some kind, we wouldn't be dealing with small sores (I'll have Dr. Lapham chat with the Derm vet to explain just how much damage Reyna tends to do with this sort of thing - the Derm vet will believe him more than me, I'm sure). So, no more info on the sores/masses for another two weeks.

As for the weight loss, it turns out Reyna has lost another two pounds in the last two weeks (she's down to 67lbs). The GI panel came back normal, which means she should be absorbing nutrients properly. I had a long chat with one of the nutritionists today, and she's putting together a potential food plan to try and get Reyna back up to at least 72lbs. She thinks Reyna probably isn't getting all of the vitamins and minerals she needs, but she realizes she's dealing with a dog with several food allergies and a sensitive stomach. She also thinks its possible that Reyna doesn't have enough pancreatic enzymes to properly digest everything, no matter what the test results show (those enzymes actually came back near the low end of normal). We tracked her weight over the last few months, and it shows that she started losing in June (could have been muscle mass since we weren't walking due to her stomach issues) with the significant loss starting around the appearance of the first mass. Reyna did gain weight after the surgery, and then lost again around the time the second mass showed up. The nutritionist and Internal Med vet both agree that whatever's messing with her belly has most likely had at least some impact on Reyna's weight. Hopefully we'll get the nutritionist's suggestions tomorrow and we can start trying them to see what (if anything) works.

I think that's everything from today...

September

2011-10-05T11:40:00.000-04:00

A few photos that didn't make it into the blog last month...

Love It When I Catch The Action

2011-10-04T16:11:00.000-04:00

Here We Go Again

2011-10-04T10:42:00.000-04:00

The open sore on Reyna's belly that I've been monitoring for a few weeks had just about healed up. This weekend, though, I found that a new mass had formed near that sore. As of this morning, the mass has ruptured and is draining. Reyna goes back to the vet school Thursday for a follow-up with Internal Medicine, hip x-rays, the results of the GI panel and urine test, and possibly a consult with Nutrition. I'm not sure, but I think the IM vet may also have Derm do a consult for another smear test to see if the bacterial infection has cleared up so they can do a culture of the sores (Reyna was supposed to see Derm this week but they couldn't fit her in for another two weeks).

The Pack

2011-10-02T17:20:00.000-04:00

Here's my pack, waiting ever-so-patiently for me to throw Reyna's ball. And yes, they stood like this all on their own, no coaching or encouragement from me.

And here's what the pack looks like after I throw the ball. Its a good thing Reyna's so tolerant of the boys.

Smartypants Jaildog

2011-09-28T21:19:00.000-04:00

Reyna had to go to the vet school this morning to have blood drawn for a GI panel and a urine sample taken to check her kidneys. She trotted in, perfectly happy to be there, although she was a little disappointed that the receptionist and the lady in the waiting area weren't excited to see her. The tech was happy to see her, though, so she forgave the other folks. She went to the lab with the tech with no trouble at all, and I stayed in the waiting area hoping it wouldn't take too long.

After just a few minutes, I heard a commotion, looked behind me and saw a nose coming through the door behind the reception desk (turns out that was the door to the lab). My first thought was that I recognized that nose, and my second was that they'd done a great job of getting both samples so quickly. My third thought was the realization that there was no one on the other end of Reyna's leash.

Reyna ran past the stunned receptionists with the tech chasing her. The tech nearly trapped her in a corner and then I called her name. Reyna turned, blew past the tech and headed straight for me. I had to walk her back to the lab - she wouldn't go with the tech. The tech (and the receptionists) said they'd never had a dog manage to open that door before. It had a push-down handle, which Reyna certainly knows how to work (that's why I have to keep my storm door locked all the time), but it was one of those heavy wooden doors that take a fair effort to push open. I have to admit, I'm very impressed with Reyna's ability to execute a jail break from the vet school lab.

About ten minutes later, I heard another commotion, looked back and saw a nose poking through the door again. I was happy to see that the tech was holding Reyna's leash this time, although it was obvious that the tech had absolutely no control over her. Reyna had her leash in her mouth and she was determined to get to me as fast as possible. As our trainer (and others) can attest, when Reyna really wants to go somewhere, the person holding on to the leash doesn't have a lot of say in the matter. The tech told me that they were able to get both samples, although it took three people to hold her down to get the urine sample. I was a bit surprised, because the folks at our regular vet's office never have this kind of trouble with her. Apparently, Reyna is tired of being poked and prodded.

We should get the results of the GI panel sometime next week, and possibly this Friday for the kidney results.

So Fast, He's Just A Blur

2011-09-24T14:10:00.000-04:00

Well, he's actually a blur because he was moving too fast for my camera's flash to catch him and it was just a bit too dim for the speed setting. But the pictures are still pretty neat, I think.

Finally, More Info

2011-09-22T21:07:00.002-04:00

The Internal Medicine vet was supposed to have all of Reyna's paperwork to me yesterday, but that didn't happen. The student called yesterday with an update, but I don't particularly trust her (we had something of a personality clash) so I wanted confirmation from the actual vet before I posted anything. After only a little harassment on my part today, the vet finally called shortly after 6pm. She apologized several times for the student and took the time to answer my questions, both of which I appreciated. So, here's the scoop, along with our next steps.

The spleen: The aspirate indicates that the nodule is benign, thank goodness. When I asked the vet how the spleen would go from "unremarkable" at the end of June to "moth eaten" now, she said that this type of change is actually fairly normal as dogs get older. She also said that the vet school's equipment is a lot more sensitive than what is normally used by regular vets and its possible Reyna's spleen didn't really look great in June, but the equipment made it hard to see the actual condition. She said its the same with the nodule - it might not have been there or it might have been very small and unnoticeable. I will be running all of this by Dr. L to see what he thinks.

The nose: An odd bump appeared on Reyna's nose Monday - I swear, it was not there Sunday. Dermatology thinks that its a focal bacterial infection due to mild trauma (darn that Kodiak and his roughhousing). They feel confident that the new antibiotics will clear it up. If not, well, what's one more thing?

The weight loss: There's some question about whether or not Reyna's weight loss is due to whatever is going on with these sores or because of the change in her diet. I had to point out more than once that she actually regained a bit of weight after her surgery and then lost it again after the mass reappeared. Which is a bit backward, if you consider she was a lot more active right after the surgery, rather than lying around like a slug. Anyway, when we realized she'd lost weight again, Dr. L had me start feeding her more. She hasn't lost more weight since then, but she's also not regaining any. And she's eating an obscene amount of food, especially considering her lower activity level. She's eating more than Duncan, for crying out loud. The vet wants her to go in for a blood test next week to run a GI panel and make sure she's actually absorbing the nutrients. If she is, but she's still not gaining weight, we'll set up a consult with the Nutrition department and see if we can come up with something that doesn't hurt her stomach or break my bank (Ha! Good luck with that!).

The follow-up: Reyna's on three weeks of antibiotics, and the vet wants her to do a follow-up with Dermatology in two weeks. Unfortunately, Derm couldn't fit her in their schedule until four weeks out. The Internal Med vet will do a follow-up first and decide whether or not she needs to stay on antibiotics longer while we wait for the Derm appointment.

So, next week she'll go for the GI panel and they'll make another attempt at getting a urine sample to check her kidneys (still not sure why they couldn't get it Tuesday - apparently my sweet girl can defeat multiple vet techs). The week after that, she'll see the Internal Med vet again. We'll discuss the GI panel, urine test (assuming they can get a sample), and current condition of her nose and belly, and consult with Nutrition. Oh, and according to the paperwork I received this evening, the Internal Med vet also wants to take x-rays of Reyna's hips so Ortho can make sure the implant hasn't been affected by whatever is going on internally. I can't say I'm too upset by that, considering the consequences if there is a problem with the implant. Two weeks after that (unless there's a significant change), she'll see the Derm vet. And then we'll see what comes from all of that.

Back From The Vet School

2011-09-20T20:44:00.000-04:00

I called the vet school for an update around 4:45. They were still waiting for the dermatology consult, but figured she'd be ready for pick up around 5:30 or so. We finally got home about 6:30, had dinner, and Reyna is pretty much passed put cold now.

Reyna's ultrasound was mostly normal. Her spleen looked "moth eaten" (which just can't be good) and they found a nodule on it. They took an aspirate of the nodule to determine if its cancerous; we'll find out sometime Wednesday. The kicker is that the spleen was "unremarkable" when she had an ultrasound done on June 27.

Dermatology found a lot of bacteria in the open sore on her belly. Can't say that I'm surprised, considering she's been running around with an open sore on her belly for several weeks. They've put her on 3 weeks of a new antibiotic. Reyna goes back to Dermatology in 2 weeks. If the bacteria has cleared up enough they'll run more tests to try and determine the underlying cause of the recurring masses.

As far as the other tests go, the chest x-ray was clear and the blood panel looked good. They couldn't do a urine/protein test because Reyna wouldn't pee for them, and she apparently took it poorly when they tried to take a sterile sample. Dermatology will try again at her follow-up, just to make sure her kidney levels are back to normal.

So now we wait some more.

Update

2011-09-20T13:50:00.000-04:00

Reyna's hanging out at the vet school this afternoon having several tests done. She's getting a full blood panel, urine/protein ratio, chest x-ray, abdominal ultrasound, aspirates taken of the sores, and a consult with dermatology. The internal medicine vet has a few ideas about what may be going on (some bad, some not so bad), and she's trying to rule out the worst possibilities. She's concerned about Reyna's weight loss along with the non-healing sores. We should have most, if not all, of the test results this afternoon.

Brotherly Love

2011-09-19T19:40:00.000-04:00

To The Vet School

2011-09-19T10:55:00.000-04:00

Reyna has an appointment at the vet school tomorrow morning for an initial consultation with internal medicine. They gave me an estimate for the work-up, which we won't be able to do until I find the money. We'll see what the doctor says tomorrow.

Kodiak's Photo Gallery

2011-09-19T07:41:00.000-04:00

Kodiak's photo gallery is finally ready for viewing! Go to Bella Luce Photography and click "Your adventure begins here." On the page that opens up, click "Proofing" and then look for a tiny little blue box in the lower right corner. Type Kodiak (and it is case sensitive) in the blue box, and you should be able to see his photos.

Sheepies!

2011-09-15T15:53:00.000-04:00

I took Kodiak out to Claire's today to see if he could function around the ducks and chickens and goats and turkeys and sheeps and Albert the Ox. I'm very proud of my boy - he did really well around all those new sights, sounds and smells. I also wanted to see if he had any interest in the sheep - after all, he is part herding dog. We tried him at Meredith's back in April and he was a little interested in the sheep, but more interested in running off to the far end of the arena. Five months is a long time for a pup his age, though, so I was hopeful we might get a different response from him this time. Boy, did we ever!

Turns out, Kodiak has a LOT of natural herding instinct. Very likely even more than Duncan does. In fact, he made me realize how much effort it sometimes takes to herd with Duncan (poor Duncan, he's such a worrier and he prefers to herd from right behind me which usually pushes the sheep ahead of me). Kodiak was soooo easy and just seemed to know where he needed to be to keep the sheep behind me or at least not running away from me. He does get very worried when I stumble, though, and he deals with that by wandering around off contact (Duncan's usual response is to run up to me, scattering the sheep in the process). He's going to have to learn to deal with that, though, because I tend to trip a lot around sheep. For such a little fellow, Kodiak has a lot of sheep-moving power. They were definitely very aware of him. Claire commented that Kodiak seems to have a natural talent for rating himself - he knows when to work the side and front of the flock, and appears able to gauge just how close he needs to be to the sheep to get them moving. I was also thrilled to see that Kodiak could focus on the sheep enough to lose his concern about the environment. I'm really pleased with how today went. I definitely have to get Kodiak back out to Claire's sometime soon, preferably with my good camera rather than my little point-and-shoot.

Sigh...

2011-09-14T14:11:00.002-04:00

Just talked to Dr. L. He really thinks surgery done by a specialist is the way to go. Anyone got a few thousand dollars they'd be willing to loan poor, sick Reyna? She's good for it, I swear.

Reyna

2011-09-14T11:05:00.002-04:00

Heard from Dr. L via email this morning. He's worried. He thinks our options are coming down to testing/surgery with a specialist (which means I need to work on my bank robbing skills) or continue waiting and hope nothing gets worse. I'm guessing Reyna can't stay on antibiotics indefinitely, and I really don't like her walking around with open sores and no protection from some unrelated infection. We're going to try and hash things out over the phone sometime today.

If anyone has any fundraising ideas (other than robbing a bank), I'd love to hear them.

CGC

2011-09-13T13:20:00.000-04:00

Kodiak passed his Canine Good Citizen test today!

He is now ReyDunc's Wiley Little Bear RLPX, NTD, CGC.

Baby Girl

2011-09-13T08:36:00.000-04:00

Sent this picture to the vet this morning - just waiting for a response. This is the mass that popped up a couple of weeks after the surgery and ruptured. We've been monitoring it and treating it with antibiotics since late August. The dark red area is the original part of this sore that's been very slow to heal. The pink area above it is where the sore has expanded a bit, developed a new drainage hole and is draining again (all since yesterday). Yet another small mass has appeared just below that sore and has grown overnight. I have no idea what we're going to do next. Unfortunately for Reyna, her health care options are severely limited by my lack of funds.

Kodiak's Photo Shoot

2011-09-13T08:16:00.000-04:00

Kodiak had his photo shoot Sunday evening at the seminary in Wake Forest. Its a beautiful area with a lot of great background options. These three photos were posted by the photographer as "sneak peeks." The full gallery should be up in a week or so.

Fall Down, Go Boom

2011-09-10T21:02:00.000-04:00

Duncan has been keeping me company on my pet sitting trips this week. He loves the place, partly because the cats are nice to him (one even stands there while Duncan licks her) and partly because there are chickens in the back yard. Our routine has been that we go in, Duncan licks Monkey, then he goes out on the back porch while I feed the cats. Duncan helps me feed the chickens and then he hangs out while I give the kitties some lovin's. Of course, this means Duncan has ample time to explore the back yard. The down side of this free time is that Duncan still has not learned how to go down stairs, and there are about 10 from the porch to a small platform that leads to the yard. I swear, sometimes I think he just builds up too much momentum and his bulk prevents him from stopping (or even slowing down).

Yesterday, Duncan got a bit too exuberant when I came out to feed the chickens. He made it down the first couple of steps and then appeared to launch himself in an attempt to get down the stairs even faster. Well, he made it down quickly, but it wasn't pretty. He hit one of the lower steps, knocked his front legs out from under himself and planted a facer on the little wooden platform. And then he slid. When he stood up, he seemed a bit confused (no surprise) and started licking his nose. I checked for splinters and damaged teeth and thankfully didn't find either. He walked a bit funny for a couple of minutes, shook it off and went about the task of guarding me from the chickens.

When we got home yesterday, this is what his snout looked like (hint: all that pink is not normal):

I didn't check it this morning, but I did look at it this evening. All that not-good pink has spread, even to his lower lip:

Lucky for Duncan, the pet-sitting gig ended today. He won't have to face those vicious stairs again any time soon.

Reyna Update

2011-09-07T21:21:00.000-04:00

The new drainage tract doesn't seem to be draining anymore, which is probably a good thing. The swelling has gone down and the area around the scar looks good. The only thing that concerns me is that the size of the sore doesn't appear to be decreasing. Dr. L says we're just going to give it more time, since she still has several more days of antibiotics.

Unfortunately, Reyna has been unable to get herself into the truck this week (she could do it last week). Dr. L thinks this is just the progression of her really crappy hips, and I'm sure he's right. Thank goodness she's just over 70lbs, since this means I have to lift her into the truck.

Fun At Suzie's

2011-09-07T21:15:00.000-04:00

As always, the pups had a great time today at Superior Dog Training.

After doing some nose work, Reyna decided it was time to get down to some serious playing:

When Kodiak's turn came, we decided to work on some agility equipment. He has come so far regarding jumps and tunnels. It wasn't that long ago that I literally had to shove him into a tunnel to get him to go through it. Today, he was taking jumps and going through the tunnel all by himself. He's had brief introductions to the dog walk and teeter-totter, but he hasn't spent much time on them before today. Its a constant surprise to discover what freaks him out and what doesn't - little things can really bother him, but he confidently handles something you'd think would send him into a panic. Go figure.

Here's Kodiak running a short agility course - chute (minus the cloth part), jumps, table, dog walk, tire and tunnel.

Here he is on the same course, but going the other way. You may not realize it, but changing direction changes everything. Just because we know its the same obstacles doesn't mean Kodiak sees them the same way.

And here's Kodiak running a partial course. Its partial because he refuses the teeter-totter at the very end. That wouldn't be so bad, except he spent several minutes going back and forth over the teeter-totter before we had him run the course. Our guess is that he was tired, and when he's tired, he stresses very easily. Maybe next time we'll have him start with the teeter....

Have no fear, Duncan had his turn at training, too. We just didn't take any videos.

Pooped Pups

2011-09-06T16:24:00.000-04:00

Today was a busy day for the pups. First, Kodiak had his CGC-prep class. He did really well, which is good, because the final exam is next week.

After taking him home, Duncan went with me to Zebulon for the pet sitting I'm doing this week. My client has six cats and three chickens (the two dogs went with her). Each cat has its own food and special requirements, so its a bit of a process. Duncan's in love with the cat named Monkey - he loves to sit and lick her. While I was feeding the chickens today, I noticed an interloper in the coop:

And a close up:

If my client wants me to kill the thing, I'll have to borrow her .22. I don't think bug spray would have any impact on that.

After bringing Duncan home, Reyna and I headed off to the bank. She's been very patient about not being the dog going places lately, so I figured she deserved a treat. Thankfully the storm kept her on her best behavior during the ride.

Everyone is now happily snoozing away, and I'm about ready for a nap, myself.

Poor Abused Puppy

2011-09-05T20:05:00.000-04:00

When Kodiak was a puppy, I fed him in his crate to keep sanity in the household (at meal times, anyway). He's so used to it that he runs into his crate when I start prepping his food. Lately, I've been asking for a few behaviors before he's allowed to eat - wait, touch, paw, watch, and occasionally a down. According to Kodiak, this is nothing but pure torture. He's so abused, he even has trouble keeping his butt on his bed because he's jiggling so much while he waits for me to release him.

August

2011-09-02T20:08:00.000-04:00

Below are some of my favorite, never-before-seen photos taken this past month. And speaking of photos, Kodiak won a free photo session through the first "Cutest Pup" contest held by Bella Luce Photography on Facebook. He won by a landslide, actually - he had 34 votes, and the next closest pup had 4. No surprise, really, since he is freakishly cute. Hopefully, we'll get that photo shoot scheduled soon.

Talked To The Vet...

2011-08-29T11:49:00.000-04:00

We're calling this thing a draining tract just because we don't know what else it could be. It ruptured sometime last night/this morning and is oozing, just like the really big mass did before the surgery.

Doc is still pretty confident this is all from a foreign body getting into Reyna and he was concerned this could happen, but he really doesn't know the best route to fix things. He had three suggestions when we talked a few minutes ago.

1 - Wait it out and see what happens with it. Try some different antibiotics in case some bacteria has worked its way in (after all, its essentially an open sore at this point).

2 - Do a second surgery with a board certified surgeon who is skilled at working around the femoral artery and the inguinal blood vessels. Surgeon would also do a culture, histopath, pathology, etc. Major down side to this is that the surgery would be 2 to 3 times the cost of the first surgery. Did I mention I'm still paying for the first surgery?

3 - Take an x-ray of the fistula tract. Inject dye into the system and see where it goes. Doc said its possible to have a foreign body enter in one place and drain somewhere totally unrelated. Problem is that the fatty tissue in the area of her draining tract doesn't react perfectly to the dye and can make it hard to get an accurate reading with the x-ray. This option also involves specialists and would be very expensive.

We're going with the wait and see with new antibiotics route, since thats the only option I can afford. The antibiotic Doc wants to use has been reported to cause problems with black and tans (GSDs, rotties, dobies, etc) so I have to take Reyna in this afternoon for a couple of tests to she if she's predisposed to the problem. If not, we give the meds a try and hope the problems don't occur. If she is, the next choice is a hideously expensive antibiotic.

Gotta stop and buy goats milk on the way home, since I'm sure the antibiotics will make her sick.

Not Again

2011-08-28T20:21:00.000-04:00

Interestingly enough, the sore near Reyna's incision that we were concerned about early last week appears to have healed up. But then this thing showed up yesterday (possibly the day before; I was busy and forgot to take photos, but I know it wasn't there on the 25th):

In case you're confused about what you're seeing, all the light pink skin on the right is healthy. The darker area left of center is the scar from her surgery earlier this month. The big red ball on the left is bad. I sent a couple of pictures to Dr. Lapham last night and got a response a little bit ago. He wants me to call him first thing in the morning - he thinks it's another draining tract that could be ready to rupture. I don't know what we're going to do. I still owe on the last surgery. Dog forbid he says she needs to go to the vet school, because that will cost a fortune. Another night of worrying ahead...

A Smidge Creepy

2011-08-26T15:34:00.000-04:00

I was outside playing with the this morning pups when I noticed four areas of this on the ground below the tree:

I looked at the tree to see what might be causing this mess, and I saw this:

And this:

They've already stripped three branches almost completely bare. When I went out this afternoon, the leaves they were sitting on when I took the photos were gone.

At this rate, the tree is going to be completely naked in a week. Unless the hurricane gets them tomorrow....

Birthday Fun

2011-08-23T22:38:00.000-04:00

My birthday present from Mary was "Paint Your Pet" night at Wine & Design. The idea with this event is that you send them a photo of your pet, they put it on a canvas, and then you paint it (with help as needed).

I used a photo of Duncan taken in 2009. I didn't do Reyna because a friend of mine who is an actual painter is doing Reyna's portrait for a belated birthday present. Here's the photo blown up for painting (the wrinkles are from adhering the paper to the canvass, not from the actual picture).

I will admit to finding the whole process very stressful. Up until I hit a certain point, anyway. All of a sudden, I was able to relax and just paint without worrying about exactly how it looked. Which is good, cause Duncan has some seriously complicated coloring when you're trying to paint it just right. I joked to Mary that if I ever decided to paint Belle, she'd turn from a tortoiseshell into a completely black cat....

Mary painted her shepherd, Bruno, and I think she did a lovely job.

My expectations for this project were fairly low - I really just wanted to be able to recognize what I painted as a dog. I was very excited when a couple of other folks could tell that I'd painted a German Shepherd. You know, considering the last thing I painted was the catiary, I think I did a pretty good job.

Maybe we'll try Kodiak next month...

Poor Pup Has No Luck

2011-08-23T08:20:00.000-04:00

The red spot near Reyna's incision that we were watching has turned into a small open sore. It has a well-defined firm round shape. Dr. L said this is what he was worried about and he's hoping this is the last bit at the inguinal canal working its way out. We're not going to do anything yet, just keep a close eye on it and see what happens over the next few days.

Its That Time Again

2011-08-22T20:00:00.001-04:00

Considering that I had to sit for two and a half hours at the DMV to renew my license, I'm really glad they gave me the eight year version this time. And that was at the DMV office that has a reputation of being one of the fastest in the area. I briefly considered leaving and coming back a different day, but I just knew that if I didn't get it done today, I'd suddenly be too busy to get it done by Wednesday, and Thursday I'd get stopped at some police checkpoint and be caught driving with an expired license. Cause that's just how my luck runs. I almost wish they were still doing the 5 year version - it'd be a lot easier to remember in connection with turning 40 than with turning 43....

Fun In The Sun

2011-08-21T20:02:00.000-04:00

The pups and I spent some time playing outside this afternoon. Reyna hasn't been able to get in her pool for quite a while, due to illness and/or injury, so I scrubbed it out and filled it up for her today. That made her a very happy pup.

Duncan never gets in the pool, of course, but he does like to hover around and wait for Reyna to get out so he can play with her.

Duncan really hates getting wet, but he loves to chase the water from the hose. Once Reyna was settled in the pool, it was Duncan's turn to play.

Surprisingly enough, Kodiak actually wasn't terrified of the water coming from the hose (although he was a little nervous about the hose itself). He didn't even seem to hate getting wet, he just wasn't interested in all that foolishness. He did enjoy teasing Duncan, though, when he got stuck in the honeysuckle bush while trying to dry his face.

And here's a little clip of Duncan playing with the water from the hose.

Its so nice to have Reyna feeling better and able to enjoy a little silliness outside.

Freedom!

2011-08-20T09:17:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, 11 days after her surgery, Reyna and I went to the vet's office to get the staples removed from her incision. I'm surprised we lasted as long as we did - I knew we'd never make it to day 14. I haven't seen this level of brattiness from Reyna since she was about 2. The only difference is that back then it was a teenage angst type of obnoxiousness, and now it's more of an unbridled joy sort of thing. Cute, really, even when she's flipping me the bird and bouncing just out of reach.

Reyna was a perfect lady while the tech removed her staples, and then she proceeded to maul Dr. L when he walked in the exam room. She wouldn't stop until she'd knocked his stethoscope off his neck and tried 3 or 4 times to tickle his tonsils. Its really a shame she doesn't like him....

Doc says his incision looks great, but there's a red spot that he's a bit concerned about. It could be nothing, just some irritation from the staples or Kodiak getting in a lucky blow. It could also be the infection trying to show itself again. We're not putting her on any more meds, but we are going to keep an eye on the area. If it clears up in a few days, yay, hooray. If not, we'll deal with it.

Reyna's staple-free incision:

5 minutes after getting home:

Its Not Cancer

2011-08-13T15:04:00.001-04:00

Just got a brief rundown of the biopsy results. Dr. L is out of town for the weekend, so we've been doing this via email and a call from one of his techs.

The histopath diagnosis: Chronic ulcerative fibrosing pyogranulomatous dermatitis/panniculitis. (Whatever the heck that is.)

The pathologist's opinion: Inflammation of this type could be initiated by infectious, foreign body, traumatic or idiopathic pathogeneses. There was, however, no evidence of predisposing factors such as visible infectious agents or embedded foreign debris discernible in the sections examined.

Dr. L's comments on the pathologist's opinion: Which in my mind backs up the likelihood of a foreign body penetration (stick/twig/sharp piece of something) causing damage with resultant ulceration/necrosis. Why it did not heal well with conservative therapy is anybody's guess, but I do wonder if I flushed out some material when I opened up the tract during surgery. If she heals well, that is the best answer of all. I will be holding my breath for the next few weeks as the tissues mend.

In simple terms - its NOT cancer.

They didn't find any microscopic particles of anything, but they aren't yet ruling out foreign body trauma. They have ruled out bacteria, fungus and other infectious agents. Now it basically comes down to how she heals. If Dr. L got rid of all traces of whatever object caused the damage (if it is foreign body trauma), she should heal nicely. If the infection comes back now that she's done with her antibiotics, then its back to the vet we go.

Sooooo happy its not cancer. Now that we’ve settled that, I’m not so worried about the other options. Reyna is feeling really great with that mass off her belly and the infection out of her system. Even one of the neighbors commented that she looks a lot peppier than she did before the surgery. The only downside is that she’s feeling well enough to be a total brat about her activity restrictions. She’s not at all happy that she has to be quiet for at least another 5 days. With luck, Dr. L will take out the staples and take her off restrictions when we hit day 10 or 11, rather than making us wait until day 14. Of course, that all depends on how her incision looks.

A couple of shots of her incision, taken this afternoon. No redness, no oozing. Paws crossed it stays that way. She's been really good about not licking, and I've been really good about jumping all over her if she looks like she's even thinking about licking.

Kodiak is still freaked out by Reyna when she's wearing her cone, which is generally when she's in her crate, and Duncan is clearly stressed out by all the drama....

Post-Op Pup

2011-08-09T17:32:00.000-04:00

We all headed out early yesterday morning to get Reyna to the vet's office for her surgery. After dropping her off, the boys and I went to Suzie's for some distraction and then to Mary's to get comforters for Reyna's crate. While we were there, Dr. Lapham called to tell me Reyna was out of surgery. He gave me a rundown of everything he found (and didn't find) during the surgery. I sent him an email last night to verify that what I heard was what he actually said, and thankfully, he called again today to go over the information a second time.

He started the surgery following the duct, since that's where the infection was coming out. Dr. L said that now he thinks that wasn't actually a duct, rather it was a draining tract. He thinks this because it went into and under the mammary gland and then towards the inguinal canal, which isn't normal for ducts. The damaged area went deep into the tissue away from the nipple, and mammary cancer typically occurs closer to the nipple. He did do a mastectomy and removed that mammary gland, along with the lymph node, because the tissue in and around it was necrotic. He wasn't able to get all of the draining tract and surrounding tissue because it was too close to the femoral artery, but he feels confident that he got most of it.

Dr. L said that he's bumping cancer a bit lower on the list because the damaged tissue didn't have the typical appearance of cancer, but he's not ruling it out. He was hoping to find a twig or some other obvious foreign body, but no such luck. However, he thinks its possible that something got into Reyna's belly, created the draining tract and damaged the tissue and then worked its way back out, leaving microscopic particles behind that have prevented the healing of the wound. He's also leaving fungus on the list of possibilities. He's still saying pretty much anything is possible - after all, this is Reyna we're talking about. At this point, its really coming down to the biopsy results of the sample he sent to the pathology lab. He said further treatment will depend on the results and how Reyna heals from the surgery. He did mention that he's a bit concerned about her weight loss over the last several weeks, but without any other indication of problems he's going to attribute it to her immune system working over time. If she heals up and there's nothing left to treat, then she should get back to her normal weight. If not, we'll deal with it. He's still leaning towards Friday for the biopsy results, but it depends on the lab.

I was able to get Reyna yesterday around 5pm. The poor girl was still groggy from the drugs and had quite a bit of trouble walking. I couldn't help it, I just had to laugh. Here's Reyna in the exam room, waiting for the vet tech to go over the post-op instructions.

Crashed out in the crate after getting home.

And passed out on her bed later in the evening. I love how her tongue sticks out when she doped up like this. She's doing better today - her tongue's been in her mouth all day.

Here's a shot of her surgical site. There are more staples that you can't see from this angle, going down to the left along the curve of the darker area. I have to say it looks a lot better than the open wound did.

Reyna didn't want any food last night, but she's been eating, drinking, peeing and pooing normally today. She clearly feels fine, because she's been arguing with me all afternoon about needing to stay calm and quiet. I'm thinking its going to be a long 14 days....

Happy Birthday!

2011-08-04T21:07:00.000-04:00

My little Mycroft is 11 years old today. Happy birthday, sweet boy!

Back From The Vet

2011-08-01T18:06:00.001-04:00

We ended up not doing any tests at the vet's today. Based on how the mass has shifted shape and location and because its not responding to antibiotics, the vet said the only real option is surgery to remove the mass and do a biopsy. Its possible the mass could be the result of a fungus or a foreign body entering the duct. The surgery will allow him to follow the duct to the mass and find a foreign body (if there is one) and do a lumpectomy. The biopsy will show if the mass is the result of a fungus. Unfortunately, the vet thinks the most likely cause of the mass is mammary cancer. If it is, the biopsy will tell us what type of cancer, and what we can expect. Doc said there’s three types of mammary cancer – bad, really bad, and really really bad. 50% of the dogs who have a lumpectomy are just fine afterwards and die years later from something unrelated. Of the remaining 50%, 25% may have a recurring tumor but no life threatening issues. In the last portion of dogs, its terminal. Doc is concerned enough about this that he's shifted his schedule to get her in surgery as quickly as possible. So, Monday the 8th is surgery, and we’ll hopefully have the biopsy results Friday the 12th. After that, we’ll see.

Back To The Vet

2011-08-01T10:01:00.000-04:00

The swelling of Reyna's whatever-it-is still hasn't gone down at all. Dr. L wants to run a couple of tests to try and get a better idea of what it is, so we're headed back to the vet later today. Lucky us.

Work Faster!

2011-07-29T11:48:00.002-04:00

I know it hasn't been very long, but I was really hoping we'd be seeing a little more improvement by now, particularly regarding the swelling. As best I can tell, the swelling hasn't gone down at all and the spot is actually looking a little oozier. The area does appear to be better defined now, rather than just one big mess. Thankfully, it doesn't look quite as raw as it did Wednesday. Reyna's being really good about not obsessing over the spot, although she does try to sneak in a lick every now and then. I also have to watch the boys. Duncan especially keeps trying to check the spot every time we go outside. I left a message for the vet with an update (and emailed him these photos) so we'll see what he thinks. I'm guessing he'll say something along the lines of give the meds more time, but he's the one that said he wanted to know if the swelling hadn't decreased within a couple of days.

Reyna's Latest Owie

2011-07-27T15:01:00.000-04:00

I was outside with the pups earlier today and noticed that Reyna's belly looked like she'd been licking a lot, so I checked it. I found a spot where she'd licked the skin off and it was oozing a bit, so I called the vet to set up a time to get some meds. After all, she licks hot spots up often enough (although none in several months) so I wasn't too concerned about getting in today or even tomorrow. While I was on the phone, though, she sat down, and I saw that the area she's been licking was very swollen. That's not a normal hot spot for her at all (green with infection, yes, extremely swollen, no). We couldn't get an appointment but they said they'd work us in if we showed up, so that's what we did.

Dr. L came out to the waiting room for a quick look shortly after we arrived. He thought she might have an abscess and said a tech would be out to get us shortly. While we were waiting for the tech, though, the office manager's dog got out of the office and decided to visit Reyna. Not good. When I saw him, I got a tight grip on Reyna's leash, stood up to do a body block, and yelled "loose dog." No one came out to the waiting room to help, and the other client sitting there (with no pets) did absolutely nothing. By that point, Reyna was going ballistic over this strange dog who kept trying to shove his nose up her rear. I was holding her as far away as I could while stomping my foot at the other dog, telling him "no" and "go away." That dog just would not take the hint. I know Reyna was telling him in no uncertain terms what she was going to do if I let go of her leash just a little bit, but he would not back off. It took a ridiculous amount of time for any employees to get in to the waiting room to help, and the office manager never did apologize. Thankfully, Dr. L seemed to realize that Reyna was not to blame for any of what happened. He asked if any teeth had connected, and I said no, because I know how to handle my dog to keep that from happening. Of course, if that dog had been more aggressive (rather than just plain stupid) we could have had a major problem on our hands.

After all that drama, we finally got into an exam room. Dr. L was initially planning to do a needle stick and take a sample of the abscess, but after poking, prodding, and getting up close and personal with it, he decided not to. Thankfully, its not as close to a lymph node as he originally thought from his first quick look. At this point, he thinks the swelling isn't an abscess, rather its Reyna's way of making hot spots more fun and exciting than they used to be (she so sweet like that, trying to keep things interesting). However, he does want to know whether or not the swelling has gone down in a couple of days. If yes, then I report in again five days later. If no, then we're looking at another visit. She has ten days of antibiotics to take, hoping that the meds help while not making her too incredibly sick (good thing I picked up more goats milk yesterday, although I'm not sure I have enough for ten days). She also has a topical spray for the spot that will hopefully keep her from licking it so much (yeah, right).

This first picture was taken with Reyna standing. Her belly is to the right, and my fingers are holding back the fur just inside her right hip.

In this picture, Reyna is sitting. The sore is obvious, the dark red around the sore is the swelling, and the light pink fur covered skin to the right is normal.

We'll see how things go over the next few days.

Rally-O!

2011-07-25T17:42:00.000-04:00

The boys had an APDT Rally trial this weekend. I'm very pleased with both of them. Duncan ran Level 1 and Level 2, racking up points, Qs and QQs for advanced titles. Kodiak stayed in Puppy Level, working very hard for his Puppy Championship.

Duncan's Level 1 runs were great. He had scores of 204, 201, and 208. Sunday afternoon he earned a perfect score of 210 with a flawless run! He also had three great Level 2 runs with scores of 204, 203 and 205. We had a bad run Sunday morning (scored 187), but most of that was my fault (the lagging and crooked sits were all him). I screwed up an exercise, did a 360 turn rather than a 270, but thankfully realized I was going the wrong way before I officially missed the next exercise and NQ'd us. When we got to the bonus, I wasn't clear in my "stay" command and he broke his stay before I took two steps away from him. The judge let us try again even though we couldn't get any points for it and Duncan executed the exercise perfectly. Naturally. That one low score put a damper on Duncan's weekend for no more than a couple of minutes. He now has 4 more Qs towards his RL1X (only needs 2 more), and 4 Qs towards his RL2X (needs 6 more). He also earned 3 QQs towards his ARCH (needs 2 more). I'm so proud of how well Duncan did this weekend. Even his 180 left pivots weren't too bad, which is impressive since he just recently discovered what "back" means...

Kodiak had a rough time this weekend. He was mostly fine with meeting and greeting, especially when folks had really yummy treats, but seeing the audience from the ring really freaked him out. And the walls were scary. He started out with a 191 Saturday morning, with his biggest problem being that he really, really did not want to have his back towards the audience, and he didn't want to walk towards them without me right beside him. He dropped to a 180 Saturday afternoon - still didn't want his back to anyone, and he also started stressing over the scary walls with their terrifying air vents. Sunday morning was the worst, with a score of 173. He was stressing over everything, from people and noises to walls and signs. The stationary exercises are hardest for him, because they give him just enough time to start thinking, which almost always leads to panic. When he's moving, its not so bad. We got lucky Sunday afternoon. The course had the required stationary signs, but there was enough heeling to get him moving. One of the other folks gave us some chunks of seasoned steak, which really snagged his attention. I also changed how we entered the ring. Instead of getting him out before the course, putting him up while I walked it, getting him out and trying to get some focus, and then asking for focus in the ring before we stated, I left him in the crate until it was time for him to go into the ring. I told the judge we were going to enter and start, no prep activities first. That seemed to help him quite a bit (no time to think about all those scary staring people). He did beautifully. He held his stay when I asked for it, did his down with no problems, and heeled like a dream. He even managed part of the bonus exercise. Kodiak earned a whopping 202 with that run, and the 4 Qs for the weekend gave him his Puppy Championship title. I'm so pleased with how well he bounced back for that last run and I have seasoned steak on my list for the next Rally trial.

Here's Kodiak in his crate after he finished his last run.

Duncan with 8 qualifying ribbons. At this level, they don't give placement rosettes or prizes anymore, just qualifying ribbons.

Kodiak being smug about his ribbons and toy (notice his tongue sticking out). He technically wasn't supposed to get any rosettes for placements, either, but one of the judges thought he deserved them anyway. The toy and big rosette are for his RLPX.

He's a bit more dignified in this one. And before you say anything, John, yes, he's just as afraid of the ribbons as he was the STAR Puppy medal. It took quite a few tries to get pictures of him sitting in the chair, rather than bolting from it.

In a couple of weeks we should have some great photos from the trial. They had a photographer come in and she'll be sending me a CD with all the pictures she took of Duncan and Kodiak over the weekend. Can't wait to see those!

He's A Star!

2011-07-22T19:49:00.001-04:00

As part of the Puppy Confidence class that Kodiak recently completed, he tested for the AKC STAR Puppy program. This is for puppies under a year old, a pre-Canine Good Citizen certification. It includes some basic obedience, with and without distractions, and allowing someone else to pet him. Kodiak passed with flying colors, naturally. His certificate and medal finally arrived in the mail yesterday.

Reyna's Baby

2011-07-22T19:26:00.002-04:00

At the hospital last week, Reyna met her absolutely all-time favorite patient, Baby. Baby's grandmother actually saw us in the hall and asked us to come into his room. Baby was a 15-week-old who'd been in and out of the hospital since birth. He has a big dog at home, so he wasn't the least bit worried about Reyna. After greeting Mom and Grandma, Reyna was totally focused on Baby. She was very careful with him, clearly aware of the various tubes attached to him. She would stare at him for a bit, then pat him with her paw. When he smiled, Reyna would lean up and give him a few delicate little kisses, and then she'd settle back and stare some more. It was all really sweet.

Reyna was acting fairly peppy today, so we headed to the hospital despite the heat. Since we started in Pediatrics last week, we started in Cardiology today. After we finished that floor, one of the nurses checked to see if Baby was still registered. He was, so off to Peds we went. When we got off the elevator from Cardio, I asked Reyna if she wanted to go see Baby. She grabbed her leash and started trotting down the hall towards the elevator for Peds (the hospital is a bit confusing regarding which elevators actually go to which floors, but Reyna knows her way around pretty well). After making nice with some of the staff, we checked in with Child Life Services and got a list of kids to visit. I made sure they knew we were going to see Baby, since they generally don't have us visit infants. We visited with a kid who was heading to Surgery shortly, and then I started in the direction of Baby's room. As soon as Reyna saw the doorway, she bolted for the room. We were past the door before I got her stopped and could ask Grandma if we could come in - a bit of a moot point, since we were already in there.

Reyna saw Baby and started wiggling and whining. Happily, Baby was free of tubes and bandages today. Grandma tried to pet Reyna, but Reyna wasn't having anything to do with that. Mom brought Baby over, and Reyna just lost it. She was vibrating and licking and whining while trying to sit politely (that's harder to do than you might think). It was so wonderful to see Rena's utter joy in being with her Baby again.

It turns out that we got there just in time - they were getting ready to take Baby out for some tests. Just a few minutes later and we'd have missed him entirely. Mom sat in the wheelchair with Baby while they waited on the orderly who was going to push them. Reyna planted herself directly in front of the wheelchair, ears forward, eyes focused on Baby. She completely ignored the various people who came up to pet her. The orderly commented that Reyna thought Baby had food (he was gumming his fingers) and then he asked if she'd watch him like that if he started chewing on his fingers. My response? Not unless you suddenly turn into a 16-week-old infant.

When they were finally ready to go, I told Reyna to say bye to Baby. She put her paw on his foot, he grinned, and she bounced up to kiss him a few times. Multiple "awwwws" from the folks standing around. Then she sat directly in front of the wheelchair again. I told the orderly he'd need to back it up and turn around - there was no way Reyna was going to let that chair move forward. He pulled the chair backwards, turned it around, and started down the hall. Reyna popped up and started trotting along beside it - until she got to the end of the leash. Let me tell you, Reyna was not happy that I wouldn't let her accompany Baby.

Mom said there was a good chance they would be going home on Monday. For their sakes, I hope that's true. I have a feeling that Reyna will miss seeing Baby next week, though. They took a bunch of pictures last week and today, and I asked if they'd be willing to send me some for Reyna's scrapbook. Mom said she would, so I left her my email address. I hope she does - I'm sure some of those photos are absolutely adorable.

Earritations

2011-07-19T16:55:00.000-04:00

Duncan's left ear has been bothering him for a bit, so I finally took him to the vet to get it checked. I swear, the fact that it took me so long to get him there isn't because I'm a bad parent, its just because the pups have been costing me a fortune and I can't afford to go for low-level problems. The only reason I took him last week is because he's started indicating that the ear has become more aggravating, and the last thing I need is for him to collapse on the floor at the rally trial this weekend, grinding his ear into the floor because it itches. So, Friday we went to the vet and got some ointment. It does seem to be helping, although Duncan shoots me dirty looks every time I clean his ear and reapply the goo.

As far as I know, Duncan's not had any seizures since that really bad weekend. He still has some off behaviors, though, so I mentioned them to the vet while we were there. The options seem to be that Duncan is either taking a really, really long time to come back to normal, or he's having partial seizures that I don't see. I'm not completely sure which of those options worries me the most....

Reyna seems to be slowly but steadily improving with the new diet. I'm not ready to say she's all better, but I think she's headed that direction. Knock on wood. Of the three pups, she's the one most bothered by the nasty heat (current forecast shows temps of 100 for Thursday, Friday and Saturday - ugh!), and she's pretty lethargic even in the A/C. I'm not sure if we're going to go to the hospital this Friday - the rooms on the floors she's assigned to stay pretty warm. She had a good visit last Friday, though. She was able to do a bit over 2 hours, and I credit a lot of that to the 20 minutes she spent adoring a 15 week old infant. She absolutely loved that baby. The nice thing was that the family requested we come in and they were totally fine with Reyna being as close to the baby as she could get. They seemed to think it was a distinct possibility they'd still be there this Friday, so if we go, I'm going to make sure Reyna gets to see the baby again. You know, I've got to start carrying cards with my email address on them and asking people to send me copies of the pictures they take. I know they got some great shots of Reyna and her baby last week.

Birthday Boy

2011-07-12T09:39:00.000-04:00

Duncan is 6 years old today! We celebrated Saturday with cake, pressies and Aunt Mary.

Duncan says he's tired of posing, its time for cake - just a little taste!

Oooh, what did Aunt Mary bring for the birthday boy?

Funny how Duncan doesn't mind waiting for cake when there might be cookies, too...

Duncan with his birthday goodies.

Cake!

Yes, Kodiak is eating his cake in his crate. Its really safer for everyone that way.

"Mmmmm....cake good."

"Wait, she's not coming after my cake, is she?"

Gotta make sure he gets every tidbit. Kodiak even cleaned the floor of the icing the big dogs left behind.

Happy birthday, Duncan! I hope we get to celebrate many, many more!

Puppy Confidence Class

2011-07-08T09:40:00.000-04:00

I got an email late last night with pictures that Adele's mom took at graduation. I'd forgotten all about them, which is odd considering I'm the person usually nagging everyone to send me their photos...

This is Adele with Kodiak.

Ollie and Hoobie (the beagle). Kodiak and Ollie were the shy pups in class. The other three had plenty of confidence.

A cute shot of Kodiak.

Holly and Adele (front), Ollie and Kodiak (back).

Holly, Ollie and Adele. Holly is a German Shepherd/Malamute cross, and she's absolutely gorgeous. She's assertive with the other dogs, but she learned to not mess with Kodiak. Its so cute - she outweighs him by 20 pounds or more, but she's submissive to him.

Adele and Kodiak.

Holly, Hoobie and Ollie in the front, Kodiak's pants and tail in the back.

Adele and Hoobie. Hoobie is so submissive, but he was determined to hold on to the toy.

Kodiak on the puppy walk.

Kodiak jumping the tire.

This is the closest we got the mortarboard to Kodiak's head. Even with the cookie, he wasn't going to wear the thing.

Kodiak's such a good boy!

This is a great shot of Holly. Like I said, she's a gorgeous girl.

I think we'll be in the CGC class with Ollie. It'll be nice to see a familiar face. And who knows, I might eventually learn her mom's name...

Pupdates

2011-07-07T16:58:00.000-04:00

We've had a lot going on in the last week! Well, maybe not a lot, but its certainly felt that way.

Saturday, Mary came over to do some scrapbooking. Thats always fun (and tiring). I spent the day working on the pups' award book - matting certificates, mounting ribbons, and adding photos. I'm very pleased with the way its turning out. Kodiak even got into it, offering his opinion on Mary's project:

Monday evening was spent keeping Reyna calm. I was expecting fireworks, but the thunder was just as bad. She couldn't settle down, and kept moving between Kodiak's crate, the hallway, the end table, and me. This is not her happy face.

I was hoping Monday would be the last of it, but because of the storms, they moved the fireworks to Tuesday, so the poor girl had to go through it all again. I'm not sure if Kodiak is nervous about thunder all on his own, or if he's picked that up from Reyna, but he's getting to where he can't really function when its thundering. Not good, considering all the thunder boomers we have during the summer (its thundering as I'm typing this, as a matter of fact).

Tuesday was a busy day. Kodiak graduated from his Puppy Confidence class! He was even voted Most Improved Pup. He's come such a long way in the last six weeks! Of course, the mortar board was terrifying, so there was no way we were going to get a picture of him wearing it.

After graduation, Kodiak and I went to see someone very knowledgeable about puppy nutrition. I'm trying really hard to keep Reyna on the absolute minimum amount of meds, especially since she generally has so much trouble with side effects. The deworming probably did some good, but it certainly didn't solve the problems. I haven't started her on the other med the vet gave me, primarily because I wanted to give the deworming time to work. I've also been concerned that she's not getting the nutrients she needs since her diet has been so limited the last several weeks.

I got a lot of great suggestions from this fellow, the first of which was to stop feeding her rice. I'd told him about her allergies, of course, including the fact that she does much better on grain-free kibbles. I also mentioned that she'd been extra itchy lately and with my luck, she was developing an allergy to turkey. The conversation went something like this:

Him: So, she's allergic to grains?
Me: Well, I'm not positive that she is, but she does better with grain-free.
Him: And you're feeding her rice?
Me: Yes.
Him: Why?
Me: Well, she has stomach trouble, and the standard response to that is to feed rice and chicken for several days. Of course, she's allergic to chicken, so she gets turkey.
Him: But she has grain allergies.
Me: Maybe.
Him: And you're feeding rice. But you think she's developing an allergy to turkey?
Me: Maybe. I know she's been really itchy for a while now.
Him: And you're feeding rice.
Me: Well, yeah. Why do you keep saying... Oh. I'm an idiot.

In my defense, even the vet and our regular trainer both know about her food allergies and neither of them ever questioned the rice. In fact, the vet's the one that told me to feed it. So, anyway, Reyna's not had any rice since Tuesday morning, and she's already itching less. A coincidence? Maybe...

I'm also adding some raw food to her diet, rather than cooking for her. That'll help with the nutrients problem, and it is healthier. Another thing the guy suggested was raw goats milk. Its apparently a wonderful thing to give dogs, and if she's drinking the milk I can theoretically stop giving her yogurt and Pepcid. Thats my kind of supplement right there. Turns out all of the pups LOVE goats milk. Duncan and Kodiak both follow me around from the time I pull the carton from the fridge to the moment they get their bowl. Reyna loves it, too, she's just too dignified to follow me around. She knows I'll bring it to her.

I know its only been a couple of days since I made the dietary changes, but I swear she's already improving. She's less itchy, there's been no vomiting, and her stool is more solid than its been in a long time. We'll see if the trend continues, because I'm fully aware it could just be a brief upswing (she's had several of those while she's been sick). Paws crossed!

We had our regular training session Wednesday. Reyna worked on her nose work skills (excellent, as always) and Duncan on his Rally moves (seeing major improvements in some things). Kodiak had to do some obstacle work. The silly pup still won't go over jumps unless he's put directly in front of them, but he did just fine for his first experience with the teeter-totter. Go figure. After training, we made a quick stop at a friend's place. She'd worked some show at the fairgrounds this weekend and managed to get a bunch of kibble sample bags. Its great - I can feed Kodiak for nearly a month!

Now for some cuteness! I have tons of little squeaky toys in the house and yard. Its usually Kodiak that plays with them, but Duncan and Reyna both still have a bit of puppy in them.

Kodiak loves to get Duncan riled up. First the squeaking starts, and then the game of tug, generally followed by a wrestling match. As pesky as Kodiak is, though, Duncan never hurts him. Kodiak's not so great about pulling his punches...

With luck, next week will be a bit quieter. We still have hospital visits for Reyna (she's not quite ready for a full two-hour shift, but she still enjoys her therapy work) and regular pup training. Kodiak won't go to his next class until August, and the break is nice. Especially since the boys have a Rally trial coming up in a couple of weeks. I'm a bit iffy on going, as I'm worried about Duncan. As far as I know, he's not had any seizures since that awful day a couple of weeks ago, but he's not quite right. There are some odd behaviors that make me wonder if he's having small focal seizures or if something else entirely is going on. There's nothing I can really take to the vet (Doc, its awful! He walked behind the chairs during training!), just small things that aren't normal for him. I've got until the 18th to get my pre-trial entries in, so we'll see how things go next week. And I guess I could always leave it until the trial and do day-of entries. I dunno. I'll figure something out.

June

2011-07-02T12:18:00.000-04:00

To wrap up the month of June, which was a mix of good, bad and indifferent, here are some never-before-seen photos (all taken this month). They're in no particular order, just how they happened to be in the file folder.

Suzie took this one at training. Getting all three dogs to sit (or stand) next to each other isn't as easy as you might think. I have to laugh every time I realize Duncan still has his back feet on the other side of the jump...

I disturbed her beauty rest....

Pay attention to the look on Reyna's face. She's getting ready to remind Kodiak that the ball is hers and only hers.

"Mom! Kodiak's bothering me again!"

And a couple of cute videos....

Suzie and I are trying to teach Kodiak to walk Duncan. This was our first attempt at "Walking the Dog." Sadly, we have been unable to reproduce this particular trick. We're going to keep working on it, though, because its going to be really darn cute when we can get the boys to do this on command.

Another musical number from Big D and Lil' K. Kodiak doesn't yet have Duncan's staying power for holding a note, but he's working on it.

Fun Stuff

2011-06-29T15:29:00.001-04:00

Time for something a little happier than the last few days....

The boys' certificates from the last APDT trial came in Monday. Duncan officially has his Level 2 title, and his high scores earned him a second Award of Excellence.

And this is Kodiak's certificate for his Puppy level title. He didn't have high enough scores to get an AOE, but I'm still incredibly proud of him.

We've had a rough few days here lately, but I know it was harder on me than it was on the pups. Reyna just had to express her opinion of the whole brouhaha:

I kept trying to talk her into showing off her nekkidness, but this is all she'd give me. Her other side looks much the same. And no, John, we're not going to tattoo her belly.

Its taken a few days, but Duncan finally seems to be his usual self. He's back to his normal levels of clinginess and hind-end wonkiness, and he's even running around in the back yard occasionally. Of course, he still can't so much as scratch an itch without me jumping up to see what he's doing...

Kodiak, of course, is his normal puppy self. I love his tail in this picture.

And this one gives me just a touch of motion sickness...

All in all, everyone is doing pretty well. Or at least back to where they were before the weekend ran us over. Even Belle has gotten over her grudge about me not sleeping with her Saturday night. Now she's just screaming at me for touching her without her permission.

Reyna's Ultrasound

2011-06-28T09:59:00.000-04:00

Reyna had her ultrasound yesterday afternoon, and it came back clean. No cancer! This rules out a lot of potential causes for her problems, which is good. Of course, we still don't know what she has, but at least we're down to fewer options. The downside to fewer options is that tests become really expensive and will only tell us about one thing at a time.

The vet wants us to start with a deworming, just in case something was missed despite all of her negative fecals. Then Reyna will start a med for IBD (Inflammatory Bowel Disease) and see if that makes a difference. It will take a couple of weeks to see if the meds are really helping or not, but its better than doing a very expensive endoscopy, which includes anesthesia and biopsies. If the meds help, she'll probably end up on them long term, and we'll look at some possible diet changes. If the meds don't help, we'll go back to the list and see what's next. Paws crossed the meds help.

And yay! No cancer!

24 Hours

2011-06-26T14:32:00.000-04:00

I'm pleased to report that Duncan has made it 24 hours without a seizure! This is great news. Now if he can just make it another six years or so without seizures... I'm still keeping a close eye on him, of course, but I may actually sleep in my own bed tonight, rather than on the couch. Duncan is nearly back to his old self. He's still just a bit off kilter, having trouble relaxing in one place for a while, and being a little clingier than usual but he's not pacing as much as he was yesterday.

Reyna, on the other paw, has apparently decided I've not paid enough attention to her this weekend. She's been extra special sick since yesterday morning. Its a good thing her ultrasound is tomorrow afternoon.

Poor Kodiak doesn't quite know what to make of all the weird goings-on. He's been a little stressy, but he's finally relaxed enough to curl up on the couch next to me and go into a puppy coma.

Oh, and Belle is seriously ticked that I didn't sleep in the bed with her last night. I told her she could join me on the couch, but no, she's too good for that...

Another Seizure

2011-06-25T17:49:00.000-04:00

Okay, so Duncan actually had a second grand mal seizure while I was typing up the last blog post. Talk about timing... We went to the emergency clinic and ended up leaving with Valium (for him, not me, darn it). If he has another long seizure, the Valium should help stop it so that I can get him to a vet for emergency treatment. I talked with our regular vet after we got home, and he says there's no real point in using the Valium for a "regular" seizure (two or three minutes long). If Duncan starts having a very long seizure or one on top of another, though, I should definitely give him the Valium. The vet also said that he thinks we should hold off on giving Duncan phenobarb until we see if he has another seizure this weekend (and I'm inclined to agree). There's still a possibility that Duncan could just be having a couple of colossally bad days. If there's another seizure, though, we need to seriously think about putting him on regular meds. Doc also said that, for the remainder of the weekend, anything off kilter is to be documented and considered a seizure, even if its just an odd head twitch. Guess who won't be getting a lot of sleep tonight?

Since hysterical and incoherent is not a normal state for me (despite what happened this morning), I kept my normal cool during this afternoon's seizure. It even occurred to me to record it so the vet could see it (no, emergency vet lady, he is not herding sheep or chasing bunnies in his sleep). If you're interested, here it is:

Keep your paws crossed that this is Duncan's last seizure.

Duncan

2011-06-25T13:54:00.000-04:00

As if Reyna's troubles aren't enough to keep me stressed, Duncan decided he needed to send me into a total tizzy this morning. We got up at our usual 6am (thank you, Kodiak), went outside a couple of times, had breakfast, and were enjoying our after-breakfast coma. Around 7:30 I heard Duncan moving and I looked over to see him frothing at the mouth. I got up to check on him and he started seizing. He had a full-on grand mal seizure - muscle spasms, falling over, urinating on himself, etc. The seizure eventually stopped, of course, and I got him on his feet. He was clearly disoriented, but I managed to get him to his bed where he rested until John came over.

During Duncan's seizure - which certainly ranks at the top of my "Most Terrifying Things to Witness" list - I called John. The only clear thought I had was that I was going to need help getting Duncan into the truck to get him to the vet. Unfortunately for John, I was somewhat hysterical and incoherent and all he really heard was "I have to get him to the vet." It crossed my mind at one point that John probably thought Reyna had died. He's such a good friend, he came straight over without really knowing what was going on. At 7:30 on a Saturday morning, no less. After calling John, I started calling vets, trying to find one that was open - none were, of course. I figured that by the time we could get to any office they'd be open, so I really wasn't all that inclined to go to emergency clinic. Once the seizure stopped and I got Duncan settled on his bed, I called John back. He confirmed we were at the house (and not in a car accident somewhere else) and arrived within a few minutes.

Duncan was acting more himself by then, so I decided the best thing to do was call our regular vet when he opened at 8am and get his opinion. For whatever reason, they didn't start answering the phones until after 8:15 (more stress!). It was decided I'd go ahead and bring Duncan in, so off to Durham we went.

While all of this was happening, I realized that Duncan had very likely had a mini seizure yesterday morning. I saw him frothing at the mouth yesterday, but I thought he needed to be sick, based on the way he was moving his head. I got him outside just in case, but he never threw up. He seemed okay afterwards, other than being a little anxious. I also find a lot of dried spit on the kitchen floor after that, so was apparently frothing quite a bit. Dr. Lapham agreed that it sounded like a mini or partial seizure. He also commented that its possible Duncan's had more of those than I know.

Dr. Lapham ran a quick blood test on Duncan, just to make sure there wasn't any obvious cause of the seizures. The blood work came back clean, which means we really have no idea what caused the seizures. Duncan's a little old for epilepsy to suddenly show up, but its possible. Its also possible this was just a one time thing that'll never happen again. Or, it could be caused by something that we won't find without spending way more money than I have. At this point, we're in wait and see mode. The worst thing, of course, would be for Duncan to have another seizure today. If he does, Dr. Lapham wants us to go straight to the emergency clinic, rather than make the drive to Durham.

Duncan's been Velcro Dog since it happened, but he did finally settle enough to take a nap.

Crap! He just had another one! On the way to the emergency clinic!

Appointment

2011-06-23T10:32:00.002-04:00

Monday at 3pm. I hate waiting.

Back To The Vet

2011-06-23T08:19:00.000-04:00

Turns out all that cautious optimism I was working with last week was pretty useless. Reyna's still having a lot of trouble (with both ends) and our "treat the symptoms" approach isn't doing any good. Well, maybe some good, but not enough to fix the problem. Her meals these days consist of half a cup of kibble, half a cup of rice, and half a cup or so of meat. More than that or any other type of food causes problems. She can't even eat the same stuff that she could eat a couple of months ago. She's also getting pumpkin and yogurt during the day, to try and help the situation.

The vet and I chatted this morning, and we're both concerned about the fact that this has been going on for about six weeks now. If this was a simple matter of letting her innards relax and heal, she should have been showing significant improvement by now. So, we have two choices.

One - we make guesses about what it might be and treat those possibilities. The problems with that include potential side effects from the treatments (and this is Reyna we're talking about, so you know there'll be complications from side effects) and that, since we'd most likely try multiple treatments at once, we really wouldn't know which one was successful (assuming any of them were).

Two - we start testing. The biggest problem there is my bank account. Its very limited these days, which means I have to be extremely selective about what I do. The vet laid out the choices for testing, and I've decided its time Reyna went in for an ultrasound. Its $320 (ouch!), but it'll give us the biggest bang for our buck. The vet may not be able to give me a definitive "this is it" answer after the ultrasound, but he'll at least be able to rule out a whole lot of possibilities. Either way, we should have a much better idea of what's going on after the ultrasound. I'm waiting on the vet's tech to call me back and schedule the appointment. Hopefully, we'll get this done tomorrow or Monday (I vote for tomorrow).

New Titles

2011-06-22T19:22:00.000-04:00

The pups' certificates came in today (clearly, this goes a lot faster when I submit the paperwork online rather than through the mail). We even have an extra brag with this - according to the organization's website, Reyna is the first German Shepherd Dog to get an Expert title.

Reyna is now officially Vereyna, RL1, ETD, CGC.

Duncan is officially D'Cans Dark Warrior Dreaming, RA, RL2, PT-s, JHD-s, ITD, CGC.

And Kodiak is officially ReyDunc's Wiley Little Bear, RLP, NTD.

Yay, Pups!

Toes Up Part 2

2011-06-19T21:20:00.000-04:00

Kodiak is definitely relaxed. And its easier to tell he's still breathing since he doesn't bury himself under sheets and blankets...

Toes Up

2011-06-17T11:13:00.000-04:00

I knew Mikey wasn't dead because his girlfriend was sleeping peacefully off to the side. But just to be positive, I made sure he was breathing.

Trick Dogs

2011-06-16T09:45:00.001-04:00

Warning: This is a long one, but its worth it....

Yesterday was a big day for the Hamlin pups. Reyna finished off the requirements for her Expert Trick Dog title, Duncan completed the requirements for his Intermediate Trick Dog title, and Kodiak did all the exercises needed for his Novice Trick Dog title. It was amazing! The pups all worked really hard yesterday (took us about two hours, I think). I really love the Trick Dog stuff. First, its tricks! Its just fun. Second, you can modify the tricks to accommodate dogs with health problems (like Reyna). And third, you don't have to pay huge entry fees and schlep all over the place hoping everything goes well during your one try. Instead, you just have to have a witness sign off on the tricks and you can do them over time and/or via video. Its great!

First up was Reyna. For the Expert Trick Dog, she had to complete 5 exercises. We chose Contraband Search, Find the Object with My Scent, Shell Game, Track a Person's Scent Trail, and Weave Poles.

Reyna completed her Contraband Search last week, which is pretty impressive since she wasn't feeling well at all. For this exercise, Reyna had to find a specific, non-food scent - we used tea tree oil - and indicate the object. If you watch her nose, you can see exactly how the air has moved the scent from the box in the corner, up the side of the table, and along the wall to the front of the room. Her article indication is nice and clear - pawing at the object.

The Track a Person's Scent Trail exercise was really easy for Reyna - she's never forgotten her SAR training. We did this exercise back in May, shortly before she got sick. I didn't realize just how glad I'd be we did this one early - at the time, I was thinking about the coming heat. Reyna hates to work outside when its hot, and who can blame her for that? Suzie is the handler in this exercise and I'm hiding. When they left the building, Suzie gave Reyna a scent article to sniff so she'd know who she was tracking. You can tell Reyna's really following my footsteps when her head is down, and she's air scenting when her head comes up.

While we were out tracking, we had Reyna Find the Object with My Scent. Like the Contraband Search, she had to clearly indicate the article, which in this case was one of my socks.

Weave Poles - which she did yesterday - are hard for Reyna. With her hips all wonky, she can't weave like the dogs who do agility, but we're allowed to adjust the poles to accommodate that. We're going to keep working on these, because Suzie and I both think that with more time she can make it look a bit more like regular weave poles. But you know, if she can't, its okay.

Reyna also played the Shell Game yesterday. She has to indicate which cup is hiding the treats. She's such a silly girl!

Next was Duncan. He had to complete 12 exercises for Intermediate Trick Dog. We chose Find Hidden Treats, Leave It, Heel Forward, Hide and Seek, Leg Weave, Pick a Card from the Deck, Over/Under, Which Hand Holds the Treat, Figure 8's (2 points), and Pull a Cart (2 points).

Figure 8's are considered an Advanced trick, which is why he gets 2 points towards his title for these. This is something he learned years ago for freestyle, so he's pretty good at them.

He's not so good at Finding Hidden Treats, though. I thought about editing out the first part of this, but its such a great example of his personality. Duncan is willing to try pretty much anything I ask of him, but he's just not a nose dog.

Okay, yeah, this one's a gimme. After all, if he couldn't Heel, he certainly wouldn't have any rally titles.

This was another fun one. In Hide and Seek, Duncan has to come find me, which he does very easily. And then it got a bit silly when we tried to get out of the tunnels. Duncan really loves tunnels.

Leave It is another trick that Duncan learned a long time ago. Sometimes, if I distract him at just the right time, he'll actually forget there's a treat on his paw.

Leg Weaves are something Duncan and I never put into our freestyle routines. I really think they're harder than Figure 8's, but that mostly due to Duncan's size. I don't know many people who could look graceful trying to swing their leg over such a tall dog.

The Over/Under is another easy one for Duncan. Suzie missed almost the entire "over" portion, but if you watched the video of Duncan's Level 2 run, you know he can jump.

Duncan was not in the mood to Pick a Card from the Deck yesterday, which is why I'm so glad you can use tricks done on previous days.

Pull a Cart is another trick where the video option is really beneficial. There's no way I could get all three pups and Duncan's cart in the truck so Suzie could watch him pull it during a regular session. This video clip is from last year, but he's still working on his carting skills. Its considered an Expert trick, so it also gets 2 points towards his Intermediate title.

Which Hand Holds the Treat? Well, that would be the hand Duncan is chewing...

Finally, it was Kodiak's turn. I'd spent most of the last week recording as many tricks as possible at home, just in case we got to Suzie's and he decided to be afraid of air. Hey, its happened. For Novice Trick Dog, Kodiak had to do 12 exercises. We chose Come, Crawl, Down, Fetch (Not to Hand), Take It, Catch, Hoop Jump, Jump Over a Bar, Kennel Up, Place, Tug, Shake Hands, Side, Sit, Spin Circles, Stay, Touch Target, Touch My Hand, Tunnel, and Walk on a Loose Leash. Yep, that's right, Kodiak's an over-achiever - he did an amazing 20 tricks! And even more impressive, we only had to use one of the videos I took at home. He did all the rest of the tricks yesterday at Suzie's.

Catch, Take It and Tug are some of Kodiak's favorites. I brought some of his squeaky toys with us so he didn't have to worry about unfamiliar items.

Crawl is something Kodiak learned just in the last week. Suzie says he looks like an inchworm, and I have to agree. He's so stinking cute!

Fetch (Not to Hand) is something Kodiak loves to do. He spends a lot of time every day running after a ball or toy and bringing them back to me. For this trick he doesn't have to actually put the toy in my hand, just get it close to me.

The Hoop Jump has been a huge challenge for Kodiak. Those tire jumps are terrifying for a formerly feral pup. He's finally conquered his fear - for now.

If you thought the Hoop Jump was scary, well, those uprights make it really hard for Kodiak to Jump Over a Bar. He's still scared of the one sitting in my back yard. But this...this was just amazing. Not only did he go over the bars without me, he even went over some that were fairly high for a pup his size.

Kennel Up is the trick that we used the video from home. Suzie has a crate at her place, but I really didn't want to stress Kodiak by trying to get him in a strange crate. Besides, he was really cute in this one.

This one is a bunch of basic obedience stuff - things he has to know to do puppy level rally - Walk on a Loose Leash, Sit, Down, Stay, Come, Place, and Side.

Shake and Touch are tricks we started working on not long after Kodiak moved into the house.

Spin Circles is a relatively new trick for the pup. His "Twist" to his left seems to be a bit better than his "Spin" to the right, which is why that one made the final video cut.

Target is also fairly new. The goal is to go to the object I point to and touch it with his nose or paw. We have a little target pad that we use, and sometime Kodiak likes to mix things up by grabbing the target pad and running off with it.

Tunnel is at least as frightening as the jumps. I finally had to borrow a tunnel from Suzie and leave it in the living room for several days. He may not be tearing through the tunnels like Duncan, but at least he's willing to go through it now. And did you notice? It actually moved a bit and Kodiak didn't freeze or panic. Thats major progress.

I'm so proud of all three pups. They've worked really hard for their respective titles, each in their own way.

Loki

2011-06-15T06:52:00.000-04:00

Happy 13th birthday, fluffy boy!

Togetherness

2011-06-14T20:56:00.000-04:00

You know, getting a picture of the two of them together isn't as easy as you might think. Its a shame, since they're such a good looking pair.

Advanced Trick Dog

2011-06-09T20:11:00.000-04:00

On May 12 (yes, nearly a month ago), Reyna earned her Advanced Trick Dog title. Her certificate came in last week, I think. I know, its taken me much longer than usual to get this posted, but I've been distracted by other things, like Reyna being sick. She's still sick (vomiting and lots of diarrhea today, fun!), but I decided it was past time to post something happy for Reyna.

The timing was actually pretty good for earning the title, because we did it before she got sick. She wasn't feeling really spiffy due to the recent addition of new pain meds, but she was willing (and able) to do her thing. Naturally, Suzie and I both forgot to have the video camera handy, so these clips are all of the second run-through. Reyna did a lot better the first time around, but what can you expect? I'm sure she thought we were complete idiots for asking her to do everything again, after she'd already done a perfectly lovely job the first time.

To earn her Advanced Trick Dog title, Reyna had to perform 5 tricks chosen from a list of 25 choices. Reyna showed off Chorus Line Kicks, Figure 8's, Find the Keys, Play Dead, and Object Guard.

This is Reyna's version of the Chorus Line Kicks. This particular trick is something she came up with years ago when we were first starting in musical freestyle, and its something she still defaults to if she doesn't want to do whatever I'm asking.

Her Figure 8's through my legs are usually a little more impressive, but again, this is the second time she had to do it.

You can't actually see the truck keys, but trust me, they're in the box she flipped over. She picked this trick up in no time at all (she'd done it once or twice the week before). All I did was show her the keys, give them to Suzie to hide, and then tell her to Find the Keys.

Reyna always dies very dramatically and it occasionally takes a long time to Play Dead...

I kept this entire clip, even though the camera is all over the place and Reyna really doesn't do the Object Guard like she's supposed to. But it was just too funny to not show. The idea of this trick is that she puts her front paws on the rug thats on the table and then she stands firm while someone tries to pull the rug out from under her feet. She's not supposed to move or let the person take the rug. The first time through, thats exactly what she did. This time was a different story...

Thats my silly, smart girl!

News From The Vet

2011-06-08T07:04:00.000-04:00

Dr. Lapham called last night. The good news is that the UPC showed protein levels are down! They're still high enough to cause some concern, but they're definitely headed in the right direction. We'll check them again in few weeks, but Dr. Lapham is very happy about how far they've dropped. The bad news is that Reyna's still not feeling well, but her symptoms are all over the place. I'm positive she does this to make me crazy. The vet has no good ideas on where to go from here, so we finally decided to keep doing what we're doing and see how she is a week from now (unless there's a significant change in symptoms).

Reyna Update

2011-06-06T13:58:00.000-04:00

I took Reyna to the vet today so she could pee in a cup. This was for the follow-up UPC test (30 days since the first one). With luck we'll have the results of the UPC tomorrow and maybe have a slightly better idea of what's going on with her kidneys.

Reyna started having stomach issues again Sunday week ago. The vet sent her a few days of sucralfate, which is what she took during the first bout of stomach troubles a few weeks ago. There's been some improvement but not a lot, and she's certainly not responding to the meds like she did last time. I've emailed the vet with an update on her symptoms, and we'll talk about what to do for her when we talk about the UPC results.

Reyna and Rally

2011-05-23T14:32:00.000-04:00

This was a stressful weekend, but it ended up a lot better than I expected.

Reyna is definitely feeling much better than she did last week. The vet said we should see a significant improvement from the medication in a very short time and he was right. She was able to eat (and keep down) dinner Friday night and breakfast Saturday morning. She seemed a bit annoyed at how little food I gave her, but I was just following doctor's orders. John came to check on her while I was at the rally trial with the boys, and he said she was relatively energetic and didn't seem to feel too bad. Saturday evening, she actually had more pep than the boys or I did. Sunday morning, she was definitely disgruntled by the bland diet and small portions, which I took to be a sign of returning good health. By Sunday evening, she was acting as though she'd never had tummy troubles. She still has some meds to finish and I'm not taking her off the bland diet (its rice and stewed rabbit tonight) until the vet says its okay. I'll probably chat with him later this afternoon or early tomorrow.

The rally trial was a complete success for the boys. I'm so glad I made the decision to go (although I'm not thrilled that I'm still finding small ticks embedded in various parts of my anatomy).

Duncan ran four Level 1 courses and four Level 2 courses over the weekend. He already has his RL1 title, so the level 1 courses are for earning his RL1X championship, as well as earning points towards his ARCH title. He had very nice scores of 203, 199, 199 and 204 (out of 210 possible points). Duncan was also working on his RL2 title. He NQ'd his first run Saturday morning because he decided to refuse the jump at the last second. Silly boy. He redeemed himself that afternoon, though, with no hesitation at the jump at all. He took 1st place in his group for his remaining three level 2 runs, with scores of 201, 197 and 207, and earned his title.

He also earned quite a lot of loot during the trial - 7 qualifying ribbons, 3 first place ribbons, and 4 toys.

Here's Duncan's Level 1 run from Sunday morning:

And his Level 2 run, also from Sunday morning:

As proud as I am of Duncan, I have to admit that I've come to expect good things from him. Poor guy, he had no idea what he was getting himself into when he did so well at his first rally trial...

Kodiak, on the other paw, didn't have quite the same pressure on him (my hopes were high, but my expectations were low). I was very pleased with how well he handled all the people at the trial. He was quick to remember that those folks usually have food in their pockets. He didn't become great friends with anyone, but he did let several people pet him (with a bribe, of course). Thankfully, both judges were good about not scaring him in the ring, staying far enough back that they didn't freak him out too badly. Kodiak was entered in Puppy Level, which meant I got to treat him at any point during the course. Believe me, he needed it. Saturday he did better than I expected, although he wasn't able to focus on me as well as I'd hoped. He ended up with a 180 and a 192, both very respectable scores (lowest qualifying score is a 170). Sunday morning, he started out fairly well but went downhill rapidly. He broke a sit/stay when I accidentally brushed his tail with my foot, and then he completely lost it when a dog in the room started barking and just would not shut up. I barely got him back to finish that course, and not surprisingly, he NQ'd. Sunday afternoon was a different story. A lot of the people were gone, which I'm sure helped. That run was the best one of the weekend. He was focused (for the most part), I didn't have to repeat commands, and he even wagged his tail a few times. We finished that run with a 202 and Kodiak's Puppy title! Since we were able to qualify this weekend, Kodiak can stay in Puppy until he's 18 months old, which gives him time to practice and gain more confidence before he has to go into Level 1.

Kodiak even relaxed enough to have his picture taken with the judge that gave him his title leg.

Kodiak also came away from the trial with a lot of goodies - 3 qualifying ribbons, 3 first place ribbons (he was the only puppy competing, so 1st place was a given, but still cool), and 4 toys.

The run that I had recorded just happened to be the best of the weekend, Sunday afternoon:

I'm so proud of both of my boys, and I'm so happy that Reyna's feeling like herself again. This was just a great weekend all the way around.

Rally

2011-05-21T06:29:00.000-04:00

Reyna still looks like she feels awful, but she's managed to eat and keep down the small amounts of rice and ground bison that I gave her for dinner and breakfast. I feel guilty about it already, but I'm taking the boys to the rally trial today. Tomorrow will depend on how Reyna does. John is coming over today to check on Reyna, thank goodness, so at least I'll get an update while I'm gone. A friend offered to provide an extra crate for Reyna at the trial, but I really think she'll be happier snoozing on her own bed than hanging out in a crate all day.

Reyna

2011-05-20T14:26:00.000-04:00

Its never a good sign when Reyna wipes out my checking account during a vet visit. Granted, its not like there was a lot in there to begin with, but still...

The vet is definitely concerned about Reyna. He's hoping this is nothing more than a mild gastrointestinal upset, but its possible its connected to the high protein levels in her urine. Her temp was normal, which is good. Vet said she didn't appear very dehydrated, but he's worried that her kidneys are working too hard at keeping her hydrated and therefore not doing everything else they should. He was also disturbed by her rough/heavy breathing and her lethargic behavior during the visit. Vet gave her anti-nausea meds and another med that will coat her stomach and intestines. If she has an ulcer or other irritation, the med should essentially create a bandage over that spot. Reyna's stuck on a bland diet for a few days (assuming she'll even eat) and I'm not to give her very much. Basically, she'll get a bit of food, we'll see if she eats it, and then make sure she keeps it down. Vet said he's not worried about her losing weight nearly as much as he's worried about her eating at all. Vet also said that these meds should result in a significant improvement in a very short time (like tomorrow), so he wants an update tomorrow afternoon. If she's still having trouble after a couple of days, he said x-rays and/or ultrasounds to pinpoint the problem are a possibility. Of course, I also need to make sure she's getting enough water.

Now, to make this whole thing just that much more fun, Duncan and Kodiak have a rally trial this weekend and we won't be here during the day Saturday and Sunday. If I withdraw the boys, I lose all of the entry fees, along with the time and effort we've put in to getting ready for the trial. And Kodiak loses the chance to compete at Puppy Level for the rest of the year. I don't have an extra crate so I can't take Reyna with me (she would hate spending the day there, anyway). I hate to leave her home alone, but I also hate to cancel the trial. We'll see how she does tonight, and I'll make a decision in the morning.

Posting Delays

2011-05-20T07:18:00.000-04:00

I had planned to get a few posts done this morning, but instead I'm heading to the vet in a bit. Reyna's thrown up multiple times in the last couple of days and now she's refusing to eat.

Not Ehrlichia

2011-05-16T10:11:00.000-04:00

Finally got the results of Reyna's tick titer. Not only does she not have an active ehrlichia infection, her titer is actually lower than it was last year. Thankfully, this means we don't have to suffer through a month of Reyna on antibiotics (and I'm so glad I insisted on the test, rather than just starting the meds as the vet suggested). The downside of this is that we still don't know what's causing the high protein levels. Vet wants us to come back around June 6 (one month after the first test) for a follow-up UPC. If the number has increased, we're possibly looking at ultrasounds and biopsies. If its decreased, we count ourselves lucky and just keep a close eye on things.

More Reyna

2011-05-16T10:05:00.000-04:00

Chatted with the vet again. He thinks the lab has enough blood to run the tick test, but he'll confirm tonight. We talked a bit about what we'll do if the titer doesn't indicate an active infection. We can treat with doxy anyway, if I'm willing to put Reyna (and the rest of us) through a month of her being sick every day. If I choose to not do that, she'll go back in a month and have another UPC test done to see if/how the results change. There really aren't any other easy-to-test options; most everything else requires ultrasounds and/or biopsies. So, if the titer comes back positive, we treat for a month and then retest. If it comes back negative, we could treat anyway, but we still wait a month before we retest.

NIMBY

2011-05-11T14:39:00.004-04:00

When I took the pups out last night for their pre-bedtime potty, I looked over at the catiary and saw that Khar'pern was playing with something. At first, I thought a bug had gotten inside and she was tormenting it. Or maybe even a toad. When I walked over to see what it was, I realized she was hissing and pouncing at this:

I firmly believe that snakes have a place in the world. I just as firmly believe that that place is not in my yard, in my catiary, in my house, or anywhere near me, my dogs, or my cats. I don't know what kind of snake it was (waiting on my snake expert to get back to me on that), and it was a little thing, thank goodness, but I still didn't want it in the catiary. You can't really tell from the picture (I was focused more on getting the color than I was the position), but it was holding about half of its body off the ground while it hissed and snapped at Khar. After ~~throwing~~ gently encouraging Khar back into the house, I took a couple of photos for identification purposes, and then I proceeded to hack the snake into multiple pieces with my (what else?) hacksaw. I felt much better after tossing the pieces over the fence into the woods. Now I just have to figure out how the thing slithered into the catiary. I'm thinking there may be a small hole that needs patching...

Reyna

2011-05-11T14:11:00.002-04:00

Got the call from the vet a little bit ago. The Urine Protein:Creatinine Ratio (UPC) test shows that the level of protein in Reyna's urine is definitely higher than it should be; high enough that we need to start looking for the cause, but not quite high enough to put us in a panic. Apparently, there are a lot of things that could cause the abnormality (of course, because nothing can be simple). One possibility is ehrlichia, a tick-borne illness. Reyna had a low positive for ehrlichia last year but wasn't showing any symptoms, so we didn't worry about it since a low positive can indicate an old exposure/inactive infection. The vet thinks its possible that Reyna has been re-exposed and is reacting to that exposure. His recommendation was to put her on doxycycline for a month and then retest her urine. The problem with that plan is that Reyna always gets sick on antibiotics, so I don't want to give them to her unless we know there's a good reason. The vet is checking with the lab to see if they have enough blood for one more test. If not, we'll go by tomorrow so they can take some from Reyna. The lab will run a tick titer to see if her ehrlichia number has changed and become high enough to indicate an active infection. If yes, we'll treat. If no, I'm not sure what we'll do.

Not Good News

2011-05-09T17:46:00.002-04:00

The vet called this afternoon with the results of Reyna's blood test. Her amylase was a little off, but that's apparently not a big deal. What is potentially a big deal is that her protein levels were abnormal. She has a low albumin level, a high globulin level, and very high protein levels in her urine. The vet said this could be caused by any number of things, from very minor to very major. He has the lab running another test (should have the results tomorrow) to give him some specific numbers that will tell him if this is just something we need to monitor as time passes (minor) or if its something that we need to identify the cause of immediately (major). Cross your paws for her.

Belated Birthdays

2011-05-09T10:43:00.005-04:00

My slackness in posting means I have a couple of belated birthdays to mention.

Mirabelle turned 14 in April. I can't believe we've been together so many years!

The kittens all turned 6 in April. Khar'pern, Parm and Per'la have certainly made life in the clowder a little more interesting.

Happy belated birthdays, Belle and Kittens!

Mother's Day

2011-05-09T10:31:00.001-04:00

The kids gave me a great present – they let me sleep until 7:30 Sunday morning! The cats usually wake me up at least once before 6am, and the puppy normally forces me to get up absolutely no later than 6:30, so 7:30 felt downright decadent.

Medical Update

2011-05-07T09:38:00.002-04:00

Reyna saw the vet yesterday for her senior wellness exam. It was a good thing we booked extra time because we used every minute of it. Overall, Reyna is very healthy (ignoring her mental issues, of course). As always, her hips are the main concern. She yelped several times when the vet checked her left hip, and was a little fussy when he checked her right. The right hip is the bionic hip, so it should be better than the left. What neither of us really expected was just how bad her left hip has become. The vet said there's absolutely no cushioning (cartilage) on the joint anymore - its nothing but bone crunching on bone. Since surgery is completely out of the question at this point, the only thing we can do is try to manage her pain. The vet gave me a couple of weeks worth of Tramadol for Reyna, and if it helps, he'll prescribe a nice big bottle for her. If not, we'll add another med or try something else. She'll also keep getting her full dose of Rimadyl, as well as her regular supplements. The vet also wants Reyna to do her cavaletti exercises three times a week for the next two weeks to see if she'll start lifting her back feet. That's the other problem - she's dragging her back feet (along with falling a lot) and we can't tell if its the start of a neurological problem or just the result of really painful hips. If she's picking up her feet to get over the cavaletti bars within two weeks, then we can assume its just the orthopedic issue of bad hips. If she's still dragging after two weeks, though, we're most likely looking at the onset of a neurological deficiency. My poor little girl. She's had such a rough time of it with her hips. I'd really like to find the people who bred her parents and slap them several times.

In other medical news, Duncan is now being treated for whipworms. The vet checked with several specialists about what might be causing Duncan's issues, and the general consensus is that there's a low-level intestinal irritation (there's a shocker), and whipworms are a potential cause. So Duncan's on meds for three days, and then we'll see what happens (or doesn't happen) after that.

Catching Up

2011-05-04T20:19:00.004-04:00

Yes, I know, its been over a month since my last post. There's been a lot going on, but I just haven't felt like getting on here and writing about any of it. I'm starting to feel motivated again, so I will catch up on most of the goings on, but it'll probably take me a few days. I guess its a good thing I don't have any plans for the weekend....

To get things started, here's a quick sum-up:

We survived the tornadoes that came through the area on the 16th. We were very lucky, because there was significant damage pretty close to our neighborhood. Thanks so much to everyone who checked on us!

The cats are...well, they're the cats. Not a lot going on with them. Five of the six are using the catiary on a regular basis, which is good (Belle prefers to spend her time on the love seat in the library).

Reyna has been having a lot of bad days lately. She's started falling a lot and needs help getting into the truck every time now. She's shown a few other odd behaviors, but she still occasionally acts like her old self. She sees the vet this Friday for her annual exam, and the nice receptionist booked us some extra time to make sure we're not rushed.

Duncan's butt is still having difficulties. He's been back on his old kibble for more than a month with no significant change. His fecal exam came back negative for parasites, so the vet's still scratching his head over this one.

Kodiak is doing really nicely. He's gaining more confidence every day and I think he actually stands a chance of Q'ing at the upcoming rally trial. My Great German Chow finally has his official name: ReyDunc's Wiley Little Bear.

Here's how Kodiak likes to ride in the truck. Notice the nose sticking out the window behind him? That's how Reyna likes to ride...

Mary and I took Kodiak to Crowder Park for a Doggy Easter Egg Hunt on the 23rd. He wasn't the least bit interested in the kibble-filled eggs, but he did a great job of interacting with the other dogs and people. He even managed to relax enough to pose a few times.

Great German Chow

2011-04-01T21:32:00.000-04:00

According to the DNA results, Kodiak is....

1 - German Shepherd
2 - Chow Chow
3 - Great Pyrenees

He's a Great German Chow!

Who's Your Daddy?

2011-03-31T22:15:00.001-04:00

The results are in! I was really curious about what breeds might be part of Kodiak so I had him take a doggie DNA test a couple of weeks ago. The company I used has 185 breeds on file and they identify breeds down to the 12.5% (great-grandparent) level. For Kodiak, they were able to determine three dominant breeds that make up 62.5% of his DNA (two at 25%, the other at 12.5%). The remaining 37.5% they say is “mixed breed”, meaning there wasn’t anything else at least 12.5%. In fact, they couldn't determine any other breeds at more than 5%. In other words, Kodiak has three breeds that make up more than half his DNA, and the rest is who-knows-what. Its possible that the "mixed" portion could be a breed that they currently can't test for, but its also possible (and probably more likely) that his parents, grandparents and great-grandparents were just really friendly dogs. Before I tell you what he is, any guesses?

Kodiak’s stats:
Approx 9 months old
18.5” at the withers
40lbs

Wordless Wednesday

2011-03-30T14:20:00.003-04:00

Here's Where I Whine A Bit

2011-03-25T10:05:00.004-04:00

This has been a really crappy week. Duncan's colon is apparently still annoyed, even after his meds. Reyna's managed to vomit up some very nasty stuff on the one piece of carpet I have in the house (naturally). My butt still hurts from the long drive and a day spent in a very uncomfortable chair (the trip itself was fun, more on that later). Wednesday, I picked up Mikey for some petting and he somehow managed to dig a rear claw into the exact center of a very sensitive part of my anatomy. The darn thing still hurts. Woke up Thursday morning to discover that my back is acting up and I'm having trouble moving my left leg. To top it off, I woke up this morning to discover a chest cold has come to visit. I'm not going to say it couldn't get any worse, because I know it could and I see no reason to tempt fate. I swear, I am so ready for this week to be over.

Okay, I'm done whining. For now.

Cranky Colon

2011-03-19T08:55:00.002-04:00

The vet thinks Duncan has a cranky colon, but he also thinks we caught the problem before it turned into a pissed off colon. Duncan's on meds for five days to see if that helps the problem. If not, we'll have to reassess. The good news is that the vet didn't find any tumors or other indications of really serious problems. Since Duncan would not demonstrate his primary symptom during the visit, the vet asked for photographic evidence. I managed to get a nice shot this morning. If you're really curious, here it is.

In other vet news, Kodiak went with us yesterday to get microchipped. Southeast German Shepherd Rescue includes a microchip and registration as part of the adoption package, which is great. Kodiak had a little trouble with the doorways, but he did beautifully with the techs. I wasn't sure I was going to see him again, considering all the squealing that I heard when a tech took him into the back... Another tech even asked me where'd I get him and does he have siblings. Kodiak was so full of himself after the visit that he pranced all the way back to the truck.

Duncan

2011-03-16T19:57:00.003-04:00

Sigh. Duncan gets to go to the vet Friday morning. I'd describe the rather worrisome symptom, but I'm guessing that not everyone's stomach is as tough as mine. Let's just say that it has something to do with his back end, and not the walking parts. Anyway, with luck it'll be something minor and easily resolved. Let's all cross our paws...

Horses!

2011-03-14T11:21:00.004-04:00

Sunday afternoon, I took the boys over to John's for a visit (Reyna stayed home because she was still tired from Saturday's trip to the hospital). It was Kodiak's first trip to John's, so I knew it would be interesting.

Kodiak got to smell chickens for the first time ever.

And then he discovered a doggy's dream - composting horse manure.

My boys.

Kodiak got to meet Cheyenne, a neighbor's dog. He did fine with her, which wasn't surprising. Cheyenne and Duncan got along, too, right up until Cheyenne jumped on me and Duncan decided he wasn't too happy about that. Right as John told the neighbor that Duncan was a very passive dog, the growling started.

And finally, the main event - introducing Kodiak to the Horses!

Indy's a good Horse! for an initial meet and greet. He doesn't get too worried about dogs in the paddock.

Indy was more than willing to walk Kodiak for us.

Up close and personal.

By this point, Kodiak was comfortable with John, and he wasn't even worried about the Horses!

This is Jack. I think Kodiak was just a smidge more worried about him.

After visiting with the Horses!, we relaxed on the porch for a bit. Kodiak didn't want to climb the stairs at first, but when Michelle pulled up behind him in her car, he decided that maybe those steps weren't such a bad thing, after all. I was very proud of Kodiak - he met several new animals and people, he let John hold him, and he let Michelle and her friend pet him. One of these days, it'll be hard to make people believe he was ever feral.

She's A Good Girl

2011-03-13T22:18:00.002-04:00

Reyna didn't get to go to the hospital Thursday because of the rain, so we went Saturday afternoon instead. We got there at 1pm and had to sign in at the Critical Care waiting room. It took us almost 20 minutes to get out of there because several people wanted to pet Reyna. We spent our shift on the Pediatrics floor this time. We were given a list of 10 patients, and in over 2 hours, we only managed to get to 7 of them. Some of the patients (and their parents) just didn't want to let Reyna leave. One of the parents said Reyna is a hero - Reyna's visit was the first time her child had smiled since she'd been admitted to the hospital. Its really hard to tell a parent and patient that we have to go after hearing that. Reyna was a good girl, tolerating lots of hugs and pets, and even doing a few tricks (until I ran out of treats). We finally made our way off of Peds and back to Critical Care, where she was mobbed again. 1pm to 3:45pm is a long time (for both of us) to be socializing with a bunch of strangers, but Reyna did a wonderful job - and she was one pooped pup after all that. Its a good thing she doesn't have class tomorrow, because she's still worn out!

Miracles Do Happen

2011-03-11T21:06:00.002-05:00

Tonight, in what I can only assume was a hunger-induced delirium, Kodiak put his head in Reyna's dinner bowl.

While there was food in it.

That she was eating.

He even snagged a mouthful of food before my heart started beating again and I got him out of the way. Miracle of miracles, Reyna actually didn't eat Kodiak in retaliation. Either she's getting very mellow in her old age, she was in a hunger-induced delirium of her own, or she really likes Kodiak. I don't know which it is, but I'm grateful we aren't making a trip to the emergency vet.

Big Steps For Little Paws

2011-03-11T12:58:00.002-05:00

Kodiak's made some great progress this week. He had his first all-by-himself class this past Sunday (well, not ALL by himself - I was there, but Reyna and Duncan weren't). The class was held in a small space in a store, and although he was stressy going into the store, he settled down nicely in the enclosed space. Its easy to tell when he's worried because he'll stop taking treats. He actually let the other people in the class pet him (on the chest, not the head), and he even worked for a few minutes with another person. The other dogs in the class were small breeds, so he looked like a big dog for the first time ever.

Monday was our regular session with Suzie, and Kodiak got a lot of first time experiences there, too. He learned that he can pay attention to me while scary things are happening (he couldn't actually look at me, but he was willing to touch my hand and take a treat). He also learned that he could walk past terrifying orange cones.

I took him out on an errand today. He had a little trouble going into the store, but after a couple of minutes he was willing to take cookies from an employee. The odd noises coming from the storeroom worried him, but he handled it pretty well. He seems to be learning that I'm his safe place and that he can come to me when something scares him. He still has a ways to go with getting comfortable in parking lots, but I did manage to get some hand touches and a bit of heeling from him before we left.

All in all, I'd say he's had a very good week.

That's My Girl!

2011-03-07T18:08:00.008-05:00

Today was a big day for Reyna - she earned her Intermediate Trick Dog title! (I still have to mail in the paperwork in order to get the certificate, but all the hard stuff happened today.) Reyna had to perform 12 tricks from a specific list, and she did a lovely job.

Reyna's first trick was "pick a card." She did it on the first try, but Suzie missed the photo op. This is Reyna's response to Suzie's suggestion that she do it again...

Here's Reyna "identifying objects." She knows "squeaky," "rope," and "ball." She's learned to put her paw on the correct item (when she feels like it).

A not-so-great photo of Reyna "sitting pretty." Poor Suzie just isn't used to my camera, and I'll admit, its not the best for those quick action shots.

Reyna's "waving good-bye."

Reyna likes to use her feet, so she paws my hand to indicate "where's the treat."

Reyna has a lovely "paws up."

"Wipe your paws" is a trick Reyna initially learned several years ago - and then she started eating the rugs...

This first clip shows a few tricks - "food refusal," "hide and seek," and "over/under."

And this video shows a very impressive "Easter egg hunt" (finding hidden treats). This is the first time we've ever asked Reyna to do this trick, so she really had to figure out for herself what we were asking.

For those who are counting, her 12th trick was "heeling forward."

This is Reyna's opinion when asked how she felt about earning her Intermediate Trick Dog title. Let's face it, she's always more interested in chasing her tail.

Reyna was such a good girl today! I'm so proud of how well she did!